Tua should stay at Alabama next year

Alabama fans hadn’t mourned this badly since the death of Bear Bryant.

Their star quarterback, Tua Tagovailoa was lying on the ground from a seemingly innocuous hit. A few minutes later, it was announced that he wouldn’t return to the game. A few hours after that, it was announced he wouldn’t be returning for the year.

Alabama fans, still remembering his heroics in the 2018 National Championship Game against Georgia, asked themselves: “Will we ever see Tua play in Tuscaloosa again?”

The general thought is ‘no’. He’s going to pack his bags and go straight to the NFL, where he’ll get millions as a top-round NFL Draft pick.

But as Lee Corso says: Not so fast, my friend.

There are different reasons why he would – or should – stay.

SHOULD: He won’t be a top-round pick in the NFL any more.

Money talks to a lot of prospective NFL clients, and right now he’s seen as a massive risk by NFL owners, GMs and Scouts. He’s had three monster injuries, which is taking a toll on his body. They have to. And when he gets hit the NFL, it will be a hell of a lot harder. The teams he is going to play for are a heck of lot worse equivalently than this Alabama team, and by ‘worse’, we mean ‘porous offensive line’. A porous offensive line will get you killed in the NFL. And with two recently hurt ankles, Tua’s scrambling speed ain’t what it used to be.

SHOULD: He needs an injury-free season.

An injury-free season would vault him up the rounds and make him far more money than he would if he went in the 2020 Draft. A season of putting up gaudy stats with the offensive talent that has to stay around? Prospects: Awesome.

 WOULD: He wants the Heisman

Tua was one of the best quarterbacks in college football last year, but Kyler Murray won the Heisman. The Heisman Trophy is the pinnacle of any college football player’s career, and if it isn’t the voters that stopped him last year, it was the injury that stopped him this year. A visit to The Heisman House is all-important.

He likes where he is and isn’t ready to move on.

He loves winning National Championships, loves being with his brother, loves the success and adoration, likes being coached by the best head coach in college football, and is God on campus. It’s only a year, and he’s thirsty to win a National Championship that has him starting. He’s still got memories of what Clemson did to him, and he wants to write that wrong.