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Catching Up with The Legendary Tide

Last year, the Alabama Crimson Tide fielded one of college football's most dominant defenses of all time. Despite not winning it all in the National Championship Game, there's no denying the absolute talent that stacked the Alabama roster, especially after (for their standards) down years in 2013 and 2014. They had 7 defenders selected by the end of the fourth round this year. For this reason I'm interested in keeping an eye on what those players go on to do, especially since the Ravens felt that they wanted a piece of the action drafting it's star corner and pass rusher in Marlon Humphrey and Tim Williams respectively.

Baltimore Ravens

Let's start with the team that drew first blood in the draft. The Ravens, with the 16th pick, had the pick of the litter for whichever Alabama talent they wanted and they chose Humphrey with that selection. While Humphrey made splash plays for the Tide's 2015 championship team, he burst on the scene as a second year starter that shut down the likes of Juju Smith-Schuster, John Ross, and Malachi Dupree and made numerous splash plays including nabbing the first of 11 defensive touchdowns for the year. Williams was a pass rush specialist who hunted QBs, while growing as a more complete OLB with games against LSU showing off his run defending prowess.

Humphrey has put up consecutive great days as a corner, even if it is against Ryan Mallet. The key is that he's not just not overwhelmed by NFL talent, he's making plays and looking like an aged CB. Closer to the line, on the first day of pads Williams has come out strong.

Rookie third-round pick Tim Williams was tormenting the offensive linemen. He beat Ronnie Stanley, James Hurst and Stephane Nembot for what would have been sacks. Williams is explosive off the edge and Defensive Coordinator Dean Pees has been impressed, saying Williams has been exactly what they thought when they drafted him.

- Ryan Mink

Washington Redskins

The Redskins also picked up a pair of Alabama defenders in defensive line beast Jonathan Allen and solid play-making OLB Ryan Anderson. The Bronko Nagurski Trophy, Chuck Bednarik Award, and Ted Hendrick award winning Allen was considered a top 5 lock before news broke of him suffering major shoulder injuries and arthritis in both shoulders. He fell to 18 and the Redskins were very delighted to add him to their 24th ranked run defense, his 10.5 interior sacks could also compliment Ryan Kerrigan, a top notch pass rusher. Anderson was much less high profile, not just on the defense but even in his own LB corps. Don't let that distract from the fact that he was a solid coverage LB and an elite run stopper, with a tendency to get his hands on the ball with 7 fumble recoveries last year. He plays with stone hands and can set and plant against any tackle in college.

Allen is already running with the starters early in camp, and Head Coach Jay Gruden has noted both his and Anderson's maturity, before going on to mention that Allen has added a lot of muscle mass over the off-season already. Anderson hasn't made as much noise as the other three but he does have Kerrigan and Trent Murphy starting over him which is stiff competition.

San Francisco 49ers

Now I must admit this, by pick 10 I thought our selection was between four players: Marshon Lattimore, Malik Hooker, Derek Barnett, and Reuben Foster. Lattimore went 11th to the Saints and Barnett went 14th to the Eagles. I was thinking that we'd pick who ever the Colts didn't between Hooker and Foster, and I had assumed Foster was a no-brainer for the Colts, so I was actually expecting and extremely excited for Hooker to be a Raven. The Colts picked Hooker so I assumed then Foster was our guy before we picked Humphrey. Foster was a top 10 projected player and a top 10 talent at that. After learning from both C.J. Mosley and Reggie Ragland, being a highlight reel special team player, and 5-star recruit out of high school, Foster became the leader of maybe the best Tide defense ever with his highlight big hits, elite speed, outstanding coverage, and great pass rush ability. Between both 2015 and 2016 Foster proved he could be an elite WILL or MIKE linebacker, he was the total package. The big issues were the circle he surrounded himself with, the drug test failures, issues learning football plays, and major maturity issues (By the way I seriously suggest reading this article its very comprehensive, interesting, and telling of Foster both good and bad).

The 49ers traded back up into the first round to nab the elite LB, starting trade talks as early as the teens to get him. 49ers GM John Lynch expressed great excitement for Foster throughout the process and once he got him. Foster has started training camp on the the third team, but has also played on the second team where he even grabbed a pick-6. A big reason he's on the second team is that he was recovering from shoulder surgery. Head Coach Kyle Shanahan has noted that Foster has put in great work in the class room and learning plays.

New York Giants

Dalvin Tomlinson was a lot less polarizing than Foster, much like Anderson he was overshadowed by players in his own position group. Tomlinson was an elite run stuffing D-lineman next to the athletic Allen. Tomlinson was also shifty in his own right picking up 3 sacks and 4 pass deflections.

With the loss of Jonathan Hankins, the Giants needed a good interior presence to compliment who PFF calls the best NT in the game in Damon "Snacks" Harrison (in an interesting side note he and Brandon Williams will be battling it out for NT Supremacy this year). Harrison has had positive things to say about Tomlinson.

"Oh, SMART!" Harrison said. "Smart, the very first thing that pops out at you. A lot of the rookies, unless they're quarterbacks, that's one of the things you don't really notice. But he got coached by my former coach who taught me everything I know, Karl Dunbar. So I can see that helped him along the way, I can see everything that coach Dunbar taught me, Dalvin is picking up the same things."

- Damon Harrison

Tomlinson has received very little buzz but that's to be expected for a low-key role player that was drafted in the third at the start of training camp.

Chicago Bears

At one point Eddie Jackson was looking to be a great corner, then he got hurt and turned into a great safety, and then he got hurt again. There's no denying Eddie Jackson's talent, without injury he would have been in the conversation with Jamal Adams, Hooker, and Budda Baker. He was not just great at getting interceptions he was also great running it back for 6. He showed good speed, but elite acceleration and timing. Jackson was also a physical hitter. Alabama has been elite at producing for two positions: Linebacker and Safety, and Jackson was no exception.

The Bears made Jackson the final Tide defender selected in the draft in the 4th round. He was 100% healthy for off-season activities. While Jackson isn't yet running with the starters, he's very much in play for the free safety competition in Chicago. The Bears coaching staff has praised Jackson, especially his extremely high football IQ which enables him to make his splash plays.

Alabama Crimson Tide

Finally there are the members that have yet to graduate, and honestly a prestigious group. First there is the high profile Minkah Fitzpatrick, a former corner who replaced Eddie Jackson after his injury at Free Safety. Fitzpatrick was great in 2016, and while he struggled against shifty receivers one on one, he was a dynamic rangy safety that captivated audiences. He's currently slated as a top 10 prospect in the 2018 draft. Next to him is Ronnie Harrison, a prototypical strong safety who can cover slot receivers and tight ends one on one, tackle in space, and make huge hits all over the field. Harrison is also highly regarded as a high pick for the 2018 draft. Rounding out the secondary is Anthony Avertt, the corner who played next to Humphrey. Much like Humphrey, 2016 was the first time he started, unlike Humphrey he was very up and down. Avertt is a very solid corner in many areas but isn't nearly as athletic. Avertt is projected as a mid-rounder but can probably rise up to the 2nd with much improved play as the number 1 corner.

Closer to the line there's Rashaan Evans who is next up at LB for the Tide after a strong string of C.J. Mosley, Reggie Ragland, and Reuben Foster. Evans actually predicted that's he'd win the Butkus Award like Mosley and Foster both did. Evans was a former 5-star OLB converted to ILB and played next to Foster as the season ended. In his two starts he had 18 tackles and 1.5 sacks, his two starts were the college playoffs and national championship game. He finished the year with 4.5 sacks and 4.5 tackles for loss. Evans played opposite Anderson a lot on running plays as he was a solid edge setting and good at covering TEs. Evans is much more of an athletic type LB that is good in space. Next to him this upcoming year is the man he replaced, Shaun Dion Hamilton. Hamilton started every game with Foster last year until the playoffs and is a more physical run stopping type LB. Hamilton has been put on Butkus Award watch by many media analyst.

Finally on the line there's the line. A lot of people say next year is a great offensive draft, that's not true, its just a great draft period. The defensive line competition is holy crap good, and near the top is Da'Ron Payne. Payne was uswed a lot like Brandon Williams was used for us, to create for others. Payne is able to obliterate guards and centers one on one but was used to draw double teams to take pressure off his seniors. Now he can be moved to a more glamorous position, much like Allen's, and be the primary interior rusher and run stopper with some one else holding double team duty. Unlike Allen, Payne isn't a more slender super athletic DE who is strong enough to play DT, he's a very stout NT who is athletic enough to kick out and be a hunting DE much like Haloti Ngata. On the other side of the spectrum former breakout DE Da'Shawn Hand has been a trouble maker in Tim Williams fashion, getting arrested for suspicion of a DUI recently. While his future at Alabama remains uncertain, he is an athletic DE who is a good run stuffer and can get after the QB when needed. He was called on and lauded for his leadership this off-season before his incident.

Conclusion

It's crazy that the role players of this defense may be first round picks, like think about that. I'm really doing this in appreciation of a great team, and since the Ravens are involved. We'll check back in on these Tide players around pre-season, then again around the mid-season, and then finally around the end of the year. Whatever happens with these young men, what can't be changed is that in 2016 they came together and formed one of the most lethal defenses the world has ever seen.

The opinions posted here are those of the writer of this article. They are in no way official comments from the team, the editors of this site or SB Nation as a whole, and should not be misconstrued as such.