Alabama’s new reality: The Kalen DeBoer era will never match Nick Saban’s run, and Tide fans must accept that

It’s a new year and a new reality for Alabama football.

After hearing arguments for why Alabama should’ve been chosen for the College Football Playoff over SMU, Indiana or any playoff team without the pedigree of Alabama, the Crimson Tide spent New Year’s Eve reminding everybody why they were left out in the first place — by losing a game in which they were heavily favored against an opponent that was supposed to be overmatched.

Alabama was a 17-point favorite over Michigan, just like it was a 14-point favorite over Oklahoma and a 23.5-point favorite over Vanderbilt. It’s a loss that many people, fans and media alike, are taking great pleasure in, using it to dunk on Alabama’s omission from the playoff even though most of the noise made about Alabama’s exclusion didn’t come from Alabama itself.

And it’s all pointless noise.

The primary takeaway from this latest loss is that it should be definitive proof that the Alabama we once knew, the most terrifying force in the sport, the team everybody had to get through to win a title, is no more. It turns out Nick Saban, the greatest college football coach in the history of the sport, was an integral part of the program’s dominance.

Who knew?

In the first season post-Saban, Alabama suffered as many losses as a favorite of 14 points or more as it did during Saban’s entire tenure. According to TruMedia, the Tide went 135-3 as a favorite of 14-plus under Saban. They went 6-3 this year.

This is not an indictment of first-year coach Kalen DeBoer, though I don’t know if every Alabama fan will agree with that. It’s more of a statement on the situation and the reality of how difficult it is to reach and remain at an elite level in this sport — particularly now in the era of the transfer portal and NIL, which has helped bridge the talent gap across the top of the sport.

It’s hard to be the guy after The Guy, and DeBoer is getting a front-row seat to the reality now. Not that I could blame him for taking the Alabama job. I mean, it’s the freaking Alabama job. It’s not one that gets offered to a coach very often, and it’s extremely difficult to pass up when it is. You can win national titles there.

But you probably can’t win as many national titles as Saban did, and DeBoer has been thrust into the situation while the memories are fresh, and Alabama fans are reminded of Saban’s greatness every time he appears on television or in a commercial.

The truth that some haven’t come to grips with is that no matter how much changes in college football, Alabama will remain one of the premier programs in the sport. It will still land great recruiting classes, and it will still win a lot of games and compete for SEC championships and the College Football Playoff.

But it won’t do so every year. In some years, it will lose three or four games. One day, all Alabama fans will understand it and possibly even accept it while continuing to strive for better.

The question is whether they will come to that understanding during Kalen DeBoer’s tenure or after it.