TUSCALOOSA, Ala. -- More than a year after Kalen DeBoer replaced perhaps the greatest coach in college football history, his Alabama players don't necessarily sense that he's a different person.
But they sense a subtle difference as the second spring practice under DeBoer winds down this week.
"Coach DeBoer had his battles last year, replacing a legend like Coach [Nick] Saban in the middle of the transfer portal, and it was hard to implement everything the way he wanted," said linebacker Deontae Lawson, a returning captain.
"It was kind of hard for him to come in and be the bad cop or whatever last year. He's still laid back and still wants the players to lead, but his fingerprints are on everything now -- and he's made it known that you better be locked in."
DeBoer flashed an easy smile when told of Lawson's "bad cop" analogy.
"It was more that we were in retention mode," DeBoer told ESPN on Monday. "I wouldn't say we slacked off on any of the things that would be the standard of what we need to do and how you need to operate.
"But I do think there's another level of an edge, a harder edge."
The Crimson Tide missed the College Football Playoff in DeBoer's first season. They finished 9-4 and were plagued with the type of inconsistency that isn't uncommon when a coach takes over such a high-profile program. Alabama lost to Vanderbilt for the first time in 40 years, lost to rival Tennessee and lost to Michigan in a bowl game, but beat Georgia and LSU.
The most crushing blow for Alabama came in the next-to-last week of the regular season when the Crimson Tide were still in position to make the playoff. They went on the road and were blown out 24-3 by an Oklahoma team that was 5-5 and 1-5 in the conference.
"That's not the standard here, and we all know it," Lawson said. "But you go back and look at the way Coach DeBoer handled it. He wasn't pointing the finger at anybody else. He took it all on himself, and I think what you see now is everybody has bought in. We're one."
DeBoer said this season, and the way he has evolved, aren't unlike his second season at other coaching stops such as Washington and Fresno State.
"Your relationships are deeper," DeBoer said. "You establish that harder edge because of the understanding of what we need to do to accomplish it, and now we have the experiences for the most part together, the staff and players.
"We're more comfortable now calling each other out because our relationships are stronger, and we know that we all want the same thing. I feel like now we're closer to having the alignment between staff and players and having the right people here. Everyone has an appreciation for what each other brings to the table."
One of the things DeBoer did this offseason was bring back one of his most trusted colleagues, offensive coordinator Ryan Grubb, who was with the NFL's Seattle Seahawks last season. They first coached together in 2007 at Sioux Falls. Grubb was DeBoer's OC on the 2023 Washington team that lost in the national championship game.
As it happens, Saban, prior to his final season in 2023, tried to hire Grubb as his OC, but the coordinator elected to stay at Washington.
Two of the qualities Grubb hopes to bring to Alabama's program are consistency and strength.
"You don't play into the good too much and force yourself through the tough parts," Grubb said. "Kalen is the same way, keeping it calm when it needs to be calm and being really, really strong when you've got to be strong."
Receiver Germie Bernard, who played under DeBoer and Grubb when they were together at Washington before transferring to Alabama, said they always had answers for everything, no matter what the opposing defense threw at the Huskies.
"And really it's the belief they instilled in you as a player and the way they played off each other, adding things, tweaking things, playing to what we did best," Bernard said.
One of the big decisions that still needs to be made on offense won't be finalized until later this summer. Ty Simpson, Austin Mack and Keelon Russell are competing for the starting quarterback job.
"I think we've got three really, really good quarterbacks, and I mean that," Grubb said. "I don't think anybody has separated. They're all playing good, but they're not playing great yet. You're looking for the guy that's going to be consistent, that can show up the same and make the same plays all the time."
In an ideal world, Grubb would like to know who his quarterback is heading into the summer.
"But I wasn't expecting that either. I wasn't going into this thinking, 'Oh, I bet by practice 11 this will be done,'" Grubb said. "I didn't think that at all, and I didn't think that because I thought all three of them were good players."
Grubb said that the staff has charted every throw this spring and that Mack (162 reps) and Simpson (158 reps) have received most of the work in team drills.
At Washington, the coaching staff didn't name a starter until Week 2 of preseason camp when Michael Penix Jr., a transfer from Indiana, beat out incumbent Dylan Morris.
"That was a little bit different than our situation here," Grubb said. "Mike had started a lot of games. Dylan had started games. We had two guys that had Power 5 starting experience. So, yes, you would have loved for this guy to have grabbed it and run with it, but we're just not there yet."