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The Road to Bama: Incredible Twists and Improbable Turns Along the Alabama Crimson Tide Recruiting Trail
The Road to Bama: Incredible Twists and Improbable Turns Along the Alabama Crimson Tide Recruiting Trail
The Road to Bama: Incredible Twists and Improbable Turns Along the Alabama Crimson Tide Recruiting Trail
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The Road to Bama: Incredible Twists and Improbable Turns Along the Alabama Crimson Tide Recruiting Trail

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The University of Alabama boasts one of the nation's most storied football programs, and the recruiting acumen of coaches like Bear Bryant and Nick Saban plays a major role in that. The Road to Bama is a wild ride into the competitive world of college football recruiting, revealing how many Crimson Tide players found their way to Tuscaloosa.
LanguageEnglish
Release dateSep 29, 2020
ISBN9781641255028
The Road to Bama: Incredible Twists and Improbable Turns Along the Alabama Crimson Tide Recruiting Trail

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    The Road to Bama - Andrew Bone

    To my father, who defeated Stage 4 Colon Cancer in 2012. To two of my best friends, Jason and Jeff, who are also currently battling cancer. We pray for you guys every day. My mom—everything you have done for me. To my wife, Audrey, thank you for the endless support and love!

    —A.B.

    Contents

    Foreword by Jay Barker

    1. Lee Roy Jordan

    2. David Palmer

    3. Johnny Musso

    4. John Hannah

    5. Dwight Stephenson

    6. Marty Lyons

    7. Cornelius Bennett

    8. Bobby Humphrey

    9. Antonio Langham

    10. Jay Barker

    11. Chris Samuels

    12. Brodie Croyle

    13. DeMeco Ryans

    14. Barrett Jones

    15. Trent Richardson

    16. T.J. Yeldon

    17. Rashaan Evans

    18. Tua Tagovailoa

    Acknowledgments

    Sources

    Foreword by Jay Barker

    The memories are still so fresh. I was a 5-year-old, Little League football player in Trussville, Alabama. Our games that fall were in the morning, and as soon as the game ended, I’d sprint to my dad’s Chevrolet Caprice Classic. Jerome Barker, my father, always parked as close to the football field as he could because he knew we had to get out of there as fast as possible. He understood we had precious little time to reach our destination 15 miles away: Legion Field.

    Even as a 5 year old, I felt the rush of adrenaline the first time I walked into the stadium that was swallowed whole by a Crimson-clad mass. Holding my dad’s hand, I looked down at the field—that magical field—and that’s when the dream was planted: I wanted to be the quarterback for Alabama.

    Over my teenage years, my dad and I kept going to Legion Field. I sold Cokes in the upper deck. I swore to myself that one day I’d be Alabama’s starting quarterback, but I was a late bloomer. In the ninth grade, I stood only 5´4˝. By my senior year at Trussville High, I’d risen to six feet but only weighed 175 pounds. I was a beanpole of an 18 year old. Army and North Carolina State offered me football scholarships—to play free safety. Early in my senior year, I was crestfallen. I thought my football dream to play for Bama was dead.

    Looking back, I needed someone like Andrew Bone to scout me. I had a big game my senior year against Mountain Brook. That is where it all began for me as a quarterback prospect. It took coach Pat Sullivan seeing me play that night against his son, Patrick, to begin to get recognition from other schools. To put it another way, it took an Auburn coach to get me to Alabama. It’s crazy that I ended up being helped by the rival school. Suddenly, Florida State’s Bobby Bowden offered me a scholarship to play quarterback on the condition that I redshirt and ride the bench for a few years. But then it finally came: a scholarship offer from Alabama head coach Gene Stallings to play for the Tide. I sat in his office on a Sunday in January of 1990 and told him that I’d basically been a Bama commit since the age of 5.

    So much has changed in the recruiting process/business since my senior year of high school in 1990. And right now there is no better recruiting analyst and recruiting reporter in the nation than Andrew. Shoot, I know coaches who call him for information. Even parents of players are constantly hounding him for insight. Andrew is as plugged in as anyone when it comes to all things Alabama football recruiting.

    This is just one reason why I love The Road to Bama: Incredible Twists and Improbable Turns Along the Crimson Tide Recruiting Trail. Andrew comes on my radio show about once a week and talks eloquently about virtually every elite high school player in the nation. He even does it without notes. Some people claim to have a photographic memory; Andrew actually does. I’ve seen it in action many times, and it’s one of the most impressive intellectual displays I’ve ever seen.

    What you hold in your hands is a special narrative. I was riveted by every page, every word. Trust me: every Alabama fan will be captivated by this work—even the kids who are selling Cokes in the upper deck of Bryant-Denny Stadium.

    —Jay Barker was the starting quarterback on Alabama’s 1992 national championship team. He currently hosts The Jay Barker Show on Tide 100.9 FM.

    1. Lee Roy Jordan

    The University of Alabama’s storied program has produced many college football greats—Derrick Thomas, Cornelius Bennett, DeMeco Ryans, Jonathan Allen, and so on. But the best defensive player, arguably in both the Coach Paul W. Bryant era and the history of the program, is Lee Roy Jordan. 

    Jordan was a superstar on Coach Bryant’s first national championship team at Alabama in 1961. He helped lead one of the most dominating defenses in the history of college football, which allowed just 2.3 points per game. Imagine only giving up 25 points in an entire season. The most points scored against the Crimson Tide in 1961 were seven by North Carolina State. Alabama blasted Auburn 34–0 and finished the season 11–0 after a win against Arkansas, who at the time was a member of the Southwest Conference. The Tide were crowned national champions prior to its bowl game against Arkansas, which was standard. 

    Freshmen were not eligible to play on a college varsity team for any sport until 1968 when the NCAA allowed participation in all sports except football and basketball. Freshmen became eligible to play in football and basketball in 1972–73. So Jordan began officially playing for the Crimson Tide during the 1960 season. He is remembered for his 31 tackles in 17–0 win against Oklahoma in the 1963 Orange Bowl. That was his final game as a player for Alabama, and it was also attended by president John F. Kennedy.

    Jordan’s story started long before his Hall of Fame career in Tuscaloosa and 14 years with the Dallas Cowboys. He recalled making his first tackle at 12 years old in 1953 and didn’t stop putting ball carriers in the dirt until he retired after the 1976 season. The farm life turned Jordan into an All-American at Alabama, a five-time Pro Bowl selection, the NFL Defensive Player of the Year (1973), and Super Bowl champion (1971). But Jordan will never forget where he came from or the foundation set forth by his family.  

    Jordan was born on April 27, 1941, to Walter and Cleo Jordan, who were from south Alabama. He was part of a big family with three older brothers: Walter Jr., Carl, and Bennie Ray. He also had three sisters: Lottie, Agnes, and Darlene. The latter passed away at age 2 of leukemia. The family lived in a very small, rural farming community in Excel, Alabama, in Monroe County about 80 miles northeast of Mobile. The population was fewer than 350 in the 1940s and ’50s, and fewer than 800 people lived in Excel as of 2018. He started working daily on his family’s farm at only 4 years old at the end of World War II in 1945. I was raised on a farm, Jordan said. We raised everything you could eat. We raised our own beef, pork, vegetables. We really had one hell of a garden. My mother was an extremely good cook. I am still envious of her cooking ability to this day. It was a small town. We were out in the country. We actually didn’t have electricity until I was 12 years old. It was very rural.

    Jordan grew up riding on horses and wagons until he was 10 years old when his father bought a truck. Two years later the family purchased a radio. The Jordans also had a cotton field and grew peanuts. We had a big family and we all had work to do, he said. There were four boys and three girls. We knew what hard work was almost immediately. My mother and father introduced that to us right off the bat. They really taught us how to work and to be responsible.

    There were not a lot of opportunities to play multiple sports in the early 1950s in his small town. There were no golf or tennis teams. There was not even a baseball team. Jordan had two options: football and basketball and he became an all-district basketball player. Jordan remembers the first time he made his first stop on the football field. I was going to practice with my brothers, who were playing high school football, he said. The coach [Al Brandon] asked me if I would stand back in the safety position on the defensive side of the ball so they knew someone would be back there. After about two or three days, I finally just came up and tackled one of the boys. I did it without a helmet. The coach wanted me to be a part of the team after that. I was 12 years old. 

    Jordan played on both sides of the ball throughout his high school career. He gives a lot of credit for his development to his head coach, W.C. Majors, and his assistant coach, Joe Weaver. Coach Majors and Coach Weaver remained close with Jordan for many years. Coach Bryant became the head coach at the University of Alabama in 1958, and Coach Majors attended coaching clinics in Tuscaloosa, where he learned all he could from Coach Bryant. Jordan hit a growth spurt (gained 30 pounds and grew three inches) prior to his junior season when Alabama started taking notice in his athletic abilities. I played linebacker and running back throughout high school, Jordan said. I loved being a linebacker. I loved hitting someone rather than being hit. The moment I realized I had an opportunity to possibly go to college to play football was during my junior season. We were playing W.S. Neal in Brewton, Alabama. Alabama assistant coach Jerry Claiborne was scouting another player from the other team. I had a better game than the other guy. He came over to the dressing room to introduce himself. He said he would be back next year, and they would be keeping up with me. That’s when it all started for me. 

    Coach Bryant arrived at Alabama during Jordan’s junior season in high school. The legendary coach from Moro Bottom, Arkansas, was a defensive end for Alabama from 1933 to 1935. He also worked as an assistant coach for the Tide between 1936–40. Coach Bryant received his first head coaching opportunity at the University of Maryland in 1945. He spent one season at Maryland before becoming the head coach at Kentucky. Bryant had led Kentucky to its first SEC championship in 1950 and finished with a top 20 team each of the next three seasons. Bryant resigned from Kentucky because the basketball program led by Adolph Rupp was considered the top sport in Lexington, Kentucky, and outshined football. Bryant then became the head coach at Texas A&M, where the Junction Boys training camp began prior to his first season in College Station, Texas.

    Texas A&M finished the 1954 season 1–9. It was Coach Bryant’s only losing season as a head football coach. Coach Bryant led the Aggies to the 1956 Southwest Conference championship with a 34–21 win against Texas. Meanwhile, Alabama had suffered back-to-back 2–7 seasons under head coach Ears Whitworth. His career record in Tuscaloosa was 4–24–2, which included a 14-game losing streak between 1955 and 1956. Alabama athletics director Hank Crisp flew to Houston to convince Coach Bryant to take the Alabama job, Get your ass to Tuscaloosa where you belong so we can start winning football games, he said according to Allen Barra’s book, The Last Coach. Coach Bryant announced on December 3, 1957 he would return to Alabama to become its head coach. When asked by reporters about returning to his alma mater, he said, Mama called. And when Mama calls, you just have to come running. 

    Jordan knew there was a lot of excitement throughout Alabama when Coach Bryant returned to Tuscaloosa from talking to his high school coaches and listening to the radio.

    A College Football Hall of Fame coach, Claiborne was an Alabama assistant with Bryant from 1958 to 1960 before becoming the head coach at Virginia Tech, and he was the first to take notice of Jordan’s skills during his junior season. But Jordan said all that really mattered was Coach Bryant being the head coach at Alabama. I was also recruited by Auburn and Southern Miss, he said. A few other smaller schools recruited me. I visited Auburn, but when I heard Coach Bryant was coming home, my mind had already been made up that I wanted to play for him. I really didn’t know much about being a college football fan in the 1950s. There wasn’t all the exposure like there is now. You have to pick a side now, but back then I really didn’t follow college football much. I was learning about the schools when I took the visits.

    Auburn seemed like the most logical choice for Jordan because of his farming background. He expected to continue the family tradition after graduating from college. It seemed like a natural fit for me because they were an agricultural school, he said. I was impressed by that. I was thinking at the time I would come home and be a farmer. I thought I would get more experience at Auburn doing that than I would at Alabama, but once I met Coach Bryant, I was set on going to Alabama.

    It was an easy decision for Jordan after meeting Coach Bryant. He was naturally a defensive-oriented coach after playing defensive end for Alabama and remained partial to defensive players. It doesn’t come as a surprise that Jordan was a perfect fit. I remember meeting Coach Bryant in his office, Jordan said. He had this desk that was up on a pedestal. He was looking down on you while you were sitting there in a chair. He invited me to come play for the University of Alabama. I think I accepted on about the third word he was able to get out of his mouth.

    Jordan was officially a part of the 1959 recruiting class for Alabama. He was the first of his family to attend college. His three older brothers all joined the military after high school. Jordan played on both sides of the ball for the Crimson Tide as a linebacker and center at 6´1˝and 210 pounds. He moved strictly to linebacker midway through his junior season when Coach Bryant put sophomore Gaylon McCollough, who eventually became a noted plastic surgeon, in at center.

    Jordan was the MVP in the Bluebonnet Bowl against Texas during his sophomore season. He helped Alabama to the 1961 national championship, which included six shutouts. Alabama finished 10–1 during Jordan’s senior season. The Crimson Tide lost 7–6 at Georgia Tech (a member of the SEC until 1964). It was Alabama’s first loss in more than two years.

    The Alabama defense gave up only 39 points in 1962. The Crimson Tide didn’t win the national championship that year. USC, which was led by John McKay, finished the season 10–0, won its bowl game against Wisconsin, and was declared by polls as the national champion. Alabama played in the Orange Bowl against Oklahoma, in which President Kennedy attended. Jordan, an Alabama captain, took part in the ceremonial coin toss, which occurred in the stands rather than on the field because of security issues. Jordan called tails. He won the toss and received the commemorative coin, something he has kept to this day. Alabama may have felt slighted before kickoff as President Kennedy was on the Oklahoma side of the stadium, but it didn’t matter to Jordan, who went on to have a legendary performance. He was credited with 31 tackles and was named MVP. It was his second time winning an MVP award in a bowl game during his career with the Crimson Tide.  

    Jordan was a unanimous All-American after his senior season and was named Lineman of the Year in college football. He was one of the finest football players the world has ever seen, Bryant said, according to the National Football Foundation. If runners stayed between the sidelines, he tackled them. He never had a bad day. He was 100 percent every day in practice and in the games.

    Jordan and Coach Bryant were one in the same. They demanded perfection. They wanted everyone to give it their all on every play. It’s what Jordan was known for throughout his career. Playing for Coach Bryant was great, he said. He loved hard work. He demanded that from everyone on the team. You had to go 100 percent on every play in practice as well as the game. He would call you out on it if you didn’t. He would embarrass you in front of your teammates, and it would make you not want to disappoint him ever again.

    In his autobiography, Bear: The Hard Life and Good Times of Alabama’s Coach Bryant, Bryant raved about Jordan. I never had another one like Lee Roy Jordan. He was a center/linebacker, going both ways at 190 pounds, playing against guys like Jackie Burkett of Auburn, who was 6´3˝, 235 pounds…It’s a wonder I didn’t foul him up because I tried him at two, three different positions as a sophomore, including offensive tackle, before he became a linebacker—the best linebacker in college football, bar none. He would have made every tackle on every play if they had stayed in bounds.  

    Following his senior season, Jordan was drafted sixth overall in the NFL draft by the Cowboys in 1963. He was also drafted 13th overall by the Boston Patriots of the AFL. Jordan played all 14 seasons with the Cowboys and started 173 games. Jordan was known as killer by his teammates in Dallas, where he amassed 1,236 tackles and 32 interceptions during his career. Jordan was a captain for the Cowboys’ Doomsday Defense in the ’60s and early ’70s. He helped the Cowboys reach three Super Bowls and defeated the Miami Dolphins in 1972 for his first professional championship. He was a great competitor, said NFL Hall of Fame head coach Tom Landry, according to dallascowboys.com. Landry coached the Cowboys for 29 seasons, including all 14 of Jordan’s career. He was not big for a middle linebacker, but because of his competitiveness, he was able to play the game and play it well. His leadership was there, and he demanded a lot out of the people around him as he did himself.

     Jordan often returns to Tuscaloosa as he travels with his wife, Biddie, who he met in biology class at Alabama, to at least two home games each season. His passion for the Crimson Tide remains strong. I love it, Jordan said. I’m an Alabama boy and an Alabama supporter. I have loved everything that has gone on with the team under Coach Saban. It has been a very special thing to go back to Tuscaloosa as often as we can.

    Jordan purchased the Redwood Lumber Company and renamed it The Lee Roy Jordan Redwood Lumber Company in 1977, and it is based in Dallas, Texas. Jordan and his wife have three sons: David, Lee, and Chris. He is a member of the Alabama Sports Hall of Fame, the College Football Hall of Fame, the Senior Bowl Hall of Fame, and was inducted into the Cowboys’ Ring of Honor in 1990.

    2. David Palmer

    The deuce is loose. One of the most spectacular football players in Alabama’s storied program, David Palmer, who wore No. 2, finished third in the Heisman Trophy voting in 1993 behind Charlie Ward, who helped guide Florida State to its first ever national championship, and Tennessee quarterback Heath Shuler. Palmer could have been on the same team with Ward, but other factors, including wanting to be closer to his family and former FSU head coach Bobby Bowden telling him he would redshirt as a freshman, played a bigger role in his decision to stay in state. Palmer had three children in high school, which made going out of state a little more difficult.

    He followed in the footsteps of former Alabama greats who grew up in Birmingham. I watched a lot of high school football in town growing up, Palmer said. Cornelius Bennett and Bobby Humphrey were the guys I looked up to. They both went to Alabama. Alabama was definitely a school I felt like I could get on the field early. I didn’t want to be redshirted. Coach Stallings was also going to give me the opportunity to play baseball. I chose not to play baseball just because stuff happens so fast and I didn’t want to get behind.

    Palmer recognized his talent at an early age. The Birmingham native knew he always wanted to be in the spotlight. I started playing football since I was 5 or 6 years old, he said. I was pretty much always around football. I always played a lot of positions but mainly quarterback and running back during my peewee football years.

     Palmer teamed up with Sam Shade in his final year of peewee football. It was the first time he lined up at a different position: wide receiver. Palmer knew he didn’t have an issue catching the ball. Several years later in 1993, he became Alabama’s first 1,000-yard receiver. Shade was the established running back on the peewee team, and the team had a quarterback. It wasn’t a big deal for Palmer, who went on to score six touchdowns in the Shug-Bear Bowl Peewee Classic at Legion Field in a record-setting performance, which still stands. Palmer had previously won a few peewee championships, but it was the first one he won with Shade. The two ended up together at Alabama, where they won the national title in 1992.  

    Jackson-Olin High School did not have the same luck on the football field prior to Palmer’s arrival in high school. The football program was in the dumps with consistent 1–9 seasons. I always wanted to go to Jackson-Olin, even though I stayed on the other side of town. I was supposed to go to Parker High School, but I really wanted to see if I could help change the program at Jackson-Olin, Palmer said. "The first year

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