Alabama news: Kalen DeBoer’s Saban-like message, Ryan Williams NIL gains, rivals in cope mode

The Alabama Crimson Tide are riding high this week, fresh off that roller-coaster win over Georgia on Saturday that vaulted them all the way up to No. 1 in the latest AP Top 25 poll. But we're not yet even halfway done with the 2024 season; there's still a lot of football left to play, and plenty of hurdles left to clear to secure a spot in the College Football Playoff come December.

Anything can happen in the zaniest sport on Earth, after all, and you're only as good as your latest performance — something that Kalen DeBoer appears to understand all too well. We've got that and much more in your midweek update on all things Alabama football.

Alabama news: Kalen DeBoer making sure the Tide don't slip up after big Georgia win

DeBoer would be forgiven for taking at least a little victory lap after that Georgia game, one in which his offense spent the first half running circles around Kirby Smart's vaunted defense. (The less said about that second half, the better.) But the first-year Tide coach isn't having any of that nonsense: DeBoer wants his team squarely focused on the task at hand, a Week 6 matchup against a Vanderbilt team that recently took Missouri to overtime.

And he's willing to go to extreme lengths to get it, up to and including laying literal mouse traps around the team facility this week:

A little corny? Sure, maybe, although who are we to deny the pleasures of a good dad joke. A sign that DeBoer's head is in the right place? Absolutely. This is a man who's won literally everywhere he's been as a head coach, and you don't have that kind of success without knowing how to manage a locker room.

Alabama news: Ryan Williams' NIL value soars after huge Georgia performance

Williams had been dominant from pretty much the moment he stepped on a college field, but the whole country got to bear witness against Georgia, when the star wideout dropped 177 yards and the jaw-dropping, game-winning score on the Dawgs. Now the secret is well and truly out, and Williams feels poised to become one of the biggest names in the sport in the coming weeks. If you're wondering what that kind of star power is worth in our brave new NIL world, the answer is "a whole heck of a lot"

To be clear, that $1.5 million number isn't what Williams is actually making this season; it's just an estimate of what he could make on the open market. That number places the wideout 14th among college athletes, right in line with incoming Duke freshman (and potential No. 1 NBA Draft pick) Cooper Flagg and LSU quarterback Garrett Nussmeier.

Alabama news: SEC rivals grasping at straws amid DeBoer debut

If you can't beat 'em, hate on 'em. At least, that seems to be the strategy among several of Alabama's biggest rivals, all of whom have started working overtime to explain why a primetime win over the winner of two of the last three national titles is actually a bad thing for the DeBoer's future. First, Baton Rouge radio host Matt Moscona argues that DeBoer's first season is reminiscent of Les Miles, who managed to paper over some increasingly evident cracks with a series of improbable wins late in his LSU tenure.

A couple of things here: 1) The Les Miles Era also included a national title, another title game appearance and seven 10-win season and 2) DeBoer's coaching track record extends far beyond his time in Tuscaloosa. Miles took the LSU job after going 28-21 in four seasons at Oklahoma State; DeBoer joined Alabama after bringing Washington within 60 minutes of a championship. This was always going to be a transition year for DeBoer, and it's disingenuous to pretend otherwise.

Speaking of: Apparently Georgia fans are trying to take the sting out of that heartwrenching loss with some revisionist history:

This is the rare take that manages to be incorrect in two different directions. For starters, it was far from a sure thing that DeBoer was inheriting a "great roster"; no one expected Alabama to be bad, certainly, but the Tide lost plenty of talent in the portal, and DeBoer was responsible for keeping what players he could and building a recruiting class on the fly. He did, in fact, have to sell his program to a bunch of kids, and he apparently did a pretty good job. Georgia, meanwhile, was coming off a 10-win season when Smart took over; it's not taking anything away from Kirby to admit that the cupboard was hardly left bare by Mark Richt.