Alabama football introduced a new wrinkle in their offense when they lined redshirt freshman wide receiver, Slade Bolden, up at the wildcat quarterback position against South Carolina and he ran the football.
This was not a new position for Bolden as he played quarterback for West Monroe High School in the past. The Louisana native also won the 2017–2018 Gatorade Player of the Year award for the state of Louisiana during his senior season at West Monroe. Nick Saban said they felt comfortable lining Bolden up at QB because he has developed nicely.
“He is a core special teams guy, that has developed nicely for us,” Nick Saban said. “He has done a really good job in that regard. He also was a high school quarterback, who we just thought maybe there is something that we could utilize him for in short yardage, and he does a good job of that.”
Alabama also likes to use Bolden as the scout team quarterback when they are preparing for running quarterbacks. On last season, Bolden mirrored Kyler Murray during Alabama’s preparation for Oklahoma. Saban said they have continued to use him that way.
“Every time we play a running quarterback, he is the scout team quarterback on all these kind of things,” Bolden said. “Just something we thought we could take advantage of, has done a nice job at receiver as well. We are pleased with his development.”
Saban also believes players like Bolden bring versatility to their roster and he wants to use them to create advantages in the future.
“I think you want to feature the player you have, so if you have a player, that is capable of doing something, we will ask them to do it, which Slade can in this case,” Saban said. “We usually decide how we will handle short-yardage situation week to week.”
Former Alabama running back, Josh Jacobs, played wildcat quarterback for Alabama on last season and former Tide players, Mark Ingram and Marquis Maze, have also made some plays at the position. With Alabama showing they will like to use bolden more, this may not be the last time Bolden is in action at quarterback this season.
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Justin Smith is a Scouting/Recruiting analyst for Touchdown Alabama Magazine. You can follow him on Twitter, via @Jdsmith31Smith
