http://www.tidesports.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050727/NEWS/50727001/1067
CECIL HURT: Can Croyle last entire season? Averages say no
July 27, 2005
Brodie Croyle will be asked more questions than he can count when he
appears as one of the University of Alabamas student-athlete
representatives at the Southeastern Conference Media Days on Friday.
But the most prevalent question for the Tide quarterback will concern
the law.
That doesnt mean the sort of law that has dominated the sports
headlines in recent weeks, although someone will probably ask Croyle
about that as well.
What Croyle will be asked although he may not be able to answer
will involve the law of averages.
More specifically, Croyle will be asked if hell be able to hold up for
an entire season. And he might be asked if, after eight straight
seasons of starting at least two quarterbacks, the law of averages will
kick in and allow a Tide quarterback to make it through an entire
season.
Croyle isnt clairvoyant, of course. He cant see what might happen in
the future. He might even have a hard time explaining what has happened
in the past. He could give a dissertation on the virtues of Kevlar body
armor, but he cant say, with any degree of specificity, what will
happen. The future will depend on a lot of factors, ranging from the
maturation rate of an inexperienced offensive line to pure luck.
Since 1994, the history of the Alabama quarterback position has gone
like this. In 1995, Brian Burgdorf started most of the season, but was
finally replaced by Freddie Kitchens in the final two games of the
year.
Kitchens, built like a beer truck and tougher than a boiled boot, then
proceeded to start for the entire 1996 season and most of 1997, a
streak than reached 24 consecutive games before he was finally replaced
in late 1997. That move, which saw Lance Tucker get a pair of starts,
was based more on a desperate try-anything mentality of a coaching
staff in the throes of a miserable season than any lack of durability
on Kitchens part.
In 1998, John David Phillips started the first four games. After that,
redshirt freshman Andrew Zow took over, a move based on performance
rather than injury.
Zow then started the final eight games of 1998, and the first seven of
1999, a 15-game streak. An injury suffered in a tough loss to Tennessee
knocked Zow out for the next two weeks, with Tyler Watts getting starts
against Southern Miss and LSU. Zow came back to finish the year.
He also started the first two games of the chaotic 2000 season before
losing his job to Watts, who started the next four games before a
season-ending knee injury sustained against Ole Miss.
Watts was again the starter in 2001, and made it nine games into the
year before being sidelined with a groin injury, putting Zow back in
the lineup for the final three games.
In 2002, Watts started most of the season, but missed two games with a
foot injury, allowing Croyle to make his first career starts against
Arkansas and Georgia.
Croyle was battered pretty severely in 2003, primarily with a shoulder
injury suffered in the first game. Still, he managed to start 11 of 13
games, with Spencer Pennington and Brandon Avalos getting one start
each.
Then, in 2004, Croyle started three games before his season-ending knee
injury, followed by two Marc Guillon starts and seven by Spencer
Pennington.
There are a couple of ways to look at those facts. The most obvious is
to say that Alabama hasnt made it through a season with one
quarterback since 1997. However, if you set aside a couple of coaching
decisions, much of the musical chairs can be attributed to the fact
that two solid quarterbacks Watts and Croyle were, for want of a
kinder term, injury-prone. They didnt simply have a recurrence of one
problem, but had a variety of ailments, from knees to shoulders to
feet, that caused them to miss playing time.
Whatever the reason, the fact is that no Alabama quarterback since
Freddie Kitchens has started more than 14 games in a row. By
comparison, Jason Campbell started 32 games in a row at the end of his
Auburn career.
Obviously, Croyle cant answer questions about the future. And the law
of averages might prove to be just as hard to predict as courtroom law
has been lately.
Cecil Hurt is Sports Editor of The Tuscaloosa News. Reach him at
[EMAIL PROTECTED] or (205) 722-0225.
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