Denver Broncos consulted Nick Saban before acquiring former Alabama WR

Even NFL franchises are consulting with Nick Saban when evaluating their rosters.

The latest franchise to connect with Saban was the Denver Broncos who reportedly had general manager George Paton reach out to the former Alabama head coach prior to trading for wide receiver Jaylen Waddle according to Sports Illustrated’s Albert Breer.

“One of Paton’s scouts with a tight relationship with Nick Saban reached out, and Saban told him that Waddle was competitive, tough, sudden, and could drop his weight as fast as anyone he’d ever coached,” Breer said in his report.

Waddle demonstrated all of those characteristics during his time at Alabama where he was an immediate impact performer as a true freshman where he had a career best 848 receiving yards and seven touchdowns.

Despite his production taking a bit of a step down in 2019, he still had his fair share of dominating performances. One of those came during the 2019 Iron Bowl where he caught four passes for 98 yards and three touchdowns in a 48-45 loss to Auburn.

However, Waddle’s play from that day left a lasting mark on Bo Nix who is now the quarterback of the Broncos and also reportedly referenced the game when the team consulted him.

“Paton’s staff was already doing background work on Waddle, Breer wrote. “Bo Nix told Paton that, in the 2019 Iron Bowl, Waddle put together one of the greatest individual games he’d ever seen, even as Nix’s Auburn team beat Waddle’s Alabama team 48-45.”

Waddle’s college career would ultimately interrupted during his final season when he suffered a broken foot five games into a season where he posted more than 120 receiving yards in each of the team’s first four games.

But the toughness that Saban had mentioned in Breer’s report shined through when Waddle was able to work his way back to play in the national championship against Ohio State, catching three passes for 34 yards as the Crimson Tide went on to win a lopsided 52-24 contest.

Waddle’s success has only heightened since being drafted by the Miami Dolphins. In five seasons in the NFL, Waddle has caught a total of 373 passes for 5,039 yards and 26 touchdowns, primarily from his former Alabama teammate Tua Tagovailoa.

Since Miami has hit the reset button after a disastrous 2025 campaign where it parted ways with head coach Mike McDaniel and Tagovailoa, Waddle was traded to Denver in exchange for a first, third and fourth round pick from the upcoming NFL Draft giving Nix an elite weapon to make another push to the AFC Championship Game.