In an interview on The Dan Patrick Show (Twitter), Alabama starting quarterback delves into why he “didn’t talk to Coach Saban,” about leaving Alabama early for the 2013 NFL Draft.
McCarron also has some interesting things to say on his girlfriend, Katherine Webb, and her appearance in the Sports Illustrated swimsuit edition plus his budding friendship with Texas A&M quarterback and Heisman Trophy winner Johnny Manziel.
The interview is 10 minutes long, and truly worth your time.
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Posted in AJ McCarron, football
Tagged AJ McCarton, Alabama Crimson Tide, Alabama football, Corey McCarron, Dan Patrick Show, Johnny Manziel, Katherine Webb, SI Swimsuit Edition
Texas A&M quarterback Johnny Manziel participated in a neat trick shot video that’s sweeping the web. Lots of folks are talking about this, and I figured you might want to see what’s causing so much conversation.
Although this is an Alabama-specific blog, I’m posting the Johnny Football video because he’s a Tide rival, was very public in his support of Alabama in the BCS National Championship Game, and has developed friendships with Crimson Tide players such as Robert Lester and AJ McCarron. It seems as if anybody who meets him winds up liking him just about right away.
The video is nearly six minutes, but watch to the end. That’s the best trick shot.
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Texas A&M’s Heisman Trophy winner, Johnny Manziel, meets with reporters in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., on Sunday afternoon.
FORT LAUDERDALE, Florida — Heisman Trophy winner Johnny Manziel spent the afternoon in town and met with reporters briefly at the Harbor Beach Marriott Resort. Naturally, he was asked who will win Monday night’s BCS National Championship Game.
“Roll Tide,” the Texas A&M quarterback said.
Manziel participated in a news conference with five other award winners: Nate Boyer (Texas), Disney Spirit Award; Luke Joeckel (Texas A&M), Outland Trophy; Marqise Lee (Southern California), Biletnikoff Trophy; Johnthan Banks (Thorpe Award); Daniel Rodriguez (Clemson), Orange Bowl-FWAA Courage Award.
Asked who would win, Banks said, “SEC. Alabama.” Joeckel agreed with Banks. Lee said he would pick whoever wins “because they’re both good teams.” Boyer and Rodriguez went for Notre Dame, and Lee added he wanted to pick Notre Dame, too.
Manziel added he respects Notre Dame but he picked Alabama partly because he wants to support his fellow SEC member. Also, the Aggies’ quarterback likes what Alabama has at that position in AJ McCarron.
“They’re a very good team,” Manziel said. “(Notre Dame’s Everett) Golson is very good. He maybe hasn’t had a chance in a game like this, and AJ McCarron has been there before.”
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Alabama safety Robert Lester and Texas A&M quarterback Johnny Manziel attended the Monday Morning Quarterback Club banquet tonight and apparently had a chance to bond for a little bit.
Manziel accepted the Southeastern Conference Back of the Year award, while Lester attended with teammate Eddie Lacy as two of Alabama’s most valuable players.
This is what Lester and Manziel posted on Twitter to each other tonight:
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Alabama’s defense brings down Texas A&M quarterback Johnny Manziel on Saturday. (Copyright photo by Gary Cosby Jr. of The Decatur Daily)
The Tide still is second in total defense, while Florida State is first. In rush defense, Alabama is third, and in pass defense, the Tide ranks ninth.
Even though Alabama produced three turnovers against Texas A&M and didn’t force any, the Tide still is No. 8 nationally in turnover margin.
Alabama quarterback AJ McCarron ranks seventh in passing efficiency. Cody Mandell is 14th in punting.
Texas A&M quarterback Johnny Manziel is second nationally in total offense, trailing Baylor’s Nick Florence. He is 31st in rushing and 25th in passing efficiency.
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Despite having two of the best run blockers in the country in Chance Warmack (above) and D.J. Fluker, Alabama failed to use the run at critical times against Texas A&M. (AP photo by Dave Martin)
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TUSCALOOSA, Alabama — Texas A&M torpedoed Alabama’s national championship hopes Saturday, but they were gone before the Aggies ever came to Tuscaloosa.
While the 29-24 loss to Texas A&M probably is the broom that swept the Crimson Tide out of the national picture, tired Alabama left its edge on the Tiger Stadium turf in Baton Rouge seven days earlier.
If you want to figure out how the No. 1-ranked Crimson Tide team could lose Saturday when it was favored to win by double-digits, look there.
Alabama rallied and survived a huge game at LSU, and it marked the third week of an intense, emotional stretch that included a home win over a ranked Mississippi State team and a rivalry game at Tennessee.
This past week, practice went OK but not great. The Tide gave an OK effort, but not an effort with an edge.
In a moment of blunt honesty afterward, Nick Saban said he was concerned at the beginning of the week because the Tide looked “out of gas.” Alabama center Barrett Jones said it’s like they forgot how they became No. 1 in the first place: “It’s not that we were better; it’s because we worked harder and practiced harder.”
Texas A&M had the edge. Every great team such as Alabama meets an opponent like that sooner or later — they aren’t as good, but for one particular day, they have enough focus and drive.
Legendary Alabama coach Bear Bryant used to tell his players they needed to remind opposing teams immediately whey they had won a national championship, but on Saturday, Saban’s Tide did everything but that by falling behind 20-0.
This one looked as if everyone had fallen out of sync. That includes the coaches. Alabama offensive coordinator Doug Nussmeier called a strange game. He underused the running game, which seemed to work so well when Eddie Lacy had the ball.
That even extends to the final play, when Alabama had fourth-and-goal. The Tide ran a quick pass to the right, in which a receiver would pick off a defensive back, leaving an opening for a teammate. The pick wasn’t clean, and the throw got intercepted.
Bad play-call or sloppy effort? Maybe Alabama should’ve run the ball? You can make an argument either way.
Afterward, Saban — again in honesty mode — said whenever a play doesn’t work, he usually says they should’ve run something different.
Also, once again, Alabama’s offense struggled after halftime. After slicing the A&M lead to 20-14, the Tide didn’t get another touchdown until 6:09 remained in the game. It’s a common theme this year — third-quarter struggles. The Tide doesn’t come out of the locker room offering anything new.
Defensively, Alabama started slow, too. Again, at times the Tide defense dominated, but at others, it appeared as if it was simply holding on — well, that and Texas A&M quarterback Johnny Manziel is good. Very good. He’s like Denard Robinson or Michael Vick, but with a much more accurate arm.
To top it all off, Alabama lost its last chance to win through the tired sloppiness that invaded the Tide’s day.
Saban had warned his players all week Texas A&M liked to run a “hard count” to try to trick the defense into jumping offsides. He warned the players again as the Aggies lined up to punt, which would’ve given Alabama the ball back with decent field position and about 40 seconds to work with.
So what did Alabama do when Texas A&M ran a hard count on the punt?
Yes, the Tide jumped offsides. A sloppy mistake to pile on a day full of them.
It’s hard to defend the mountain top every week. Alabama just couldn’t do it one more time.
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Texas A&M quarterback Johnny Manziel (2) holds the Southeastern Conference single-game total offense record. (AP photo by Rogelio V. Solis)
TUSCALOOSA, Alabama — They call him Johnny Football, and now it’s Alabama’s turn to figure out how to slow him down.
Only a redshirt freshman, Texas A&M quarterback Johnny Manziel has turned into something of a larger-than-life character in Southeastern Conference football. He not only has helped the Aggies rise to No. 15 in the nation in their initial SEC season, but he has broken records along the way.
A running and passing threat, he posted 557 yards of total offense against Arkansas, breaking a record set by Ole Miss’ Archie Manning in 1969 and tied by Rohan Davey at LSU in 2001. Two weeks later, Manziel broke his own record with 576 yards against Louisiana Tech.
“Johnny Manziel is a terrific player,” Alabama coach Nick Saban said. “He can do a lot of things, creates a lot of plays, extends a lot of plays. He’s a great scrambler. A very effective passer. They’re in the spread, no-huddle, going fast. He does a really good job of executing it.”
A former Texas high school star, Manziel has made news off the field, too, which only seems to have added to his legend. This summer, he was arrested for getting involved in a bar fight and producing a fake ID. He was shirtless in his jail mugshot. Six weeks later, he was named Texas A&M’s starting quarterback.
This past week, pictures surfaced on the Internet of Manziel at a Halloween party dressed as Scooby Doo. In one photo, he is looking at the camera with a huge smile as he dances with a scantily-clad blonde.
If Alabama has faced anybody similar to Manziel, it might be Michigan’s Denard Robinson, also a running and passing threat. And like Robinson, Manziel isn’t especially tall for a quarterback — 6-foot-1 and 200 pounds, although he seems smaller. Saban compared him to former NFL quarterback Doug Flutie, who is 5-10.
Robinson struggled against Alabama in a 41-14 loss in the season opener, passing for 200 yards and rushing for 27 while throwing a pair of interceptions.
“It’s probably a lot of similarities and probably a lot of differences. … They’re both great quarterbacks and both carry their teams well,” Alabama linebacker C.J. Mosley said. “We’ve just got to do our job well and try to contain them just like we did in the first game of the season.”
Manziel sat out last season as a redshirt, while Ryan Tannehill ran the team at quarterback. Tannehill now starts for the Miami Dolphins, and Manziel is putting up similar numbers to what he did when he was an all-state performer at Kerrville Tivy (Texas) High.
As a high school senior, Manziel passed for 3,609 yards with 45 touchdowns and rushed for 1,674 yards and 30 more scores. He also caught a touchdown pass and ran a kickoff back for another. He ran for 34 touchdowns as a junior. As a sophomore, he played mostly wide receiver.
At Alabama’s practices, the Crimson Tide is using backup quarterback Blake Sims to play the part of Manziel on the scout team. Sims can run and pass, although not as well as Manziel.
“If we had somebody that could play that part, we’d play them. They’d be playing,” Saban joked. “Blake Sims probably will try to do it some, at least the running part, the scrambling part. We’ve also got to prepare our team to do what we have to do. That’s the best we can do, probably, athletically at the quarterback position to give us a look at that.”
Alabama linebacker Adrian Hubbard said he believes Sims can handle the job.
“Blake provided us with a good look when we played Michigan and Denard was at quarterback,” Hubbard said. “Everyone always asks you what’s the difference between Denard and this guy named Johnny. Our scout team, they always give you a good look every week.”
In the midst of all those great statistics and numbers about Manziel, there are a couple that should be comforting to Alabama.
When Manziel played two of the SEC’s best defenses in Florida and LSU, he struggled. Combined against those two teams, he didn’t put up as many yards as he did against Arkansas. Texas A&M also lost both games, falling to Florida 20-17 and LSU 24-19. The Bengal Tigers intercepted him three times.
“I’ve heard he’s a pretty good quarterback,” Hubbard said, “and we’re going to have to go with a game plan and execute it well.”
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