Alabama’s defense ‘loves the looks’ that one former five-star athlete is giving this week while emulating Florida State QB Tommy Castellanos
Alabama’s defense is gearing up for a challenge with Tommy Castellanos and Florida State coming up on Saturday.
The Alabama Crimson Tide are set to open up its 2025 season with Florida State on Saturday. The Seminoles have announced Boston College transfer Tommy Castellanos as their new starting quarterback, which could present some challenges for Alabama’s defense — especially on the ground.
In his two seasons at Boston College, Castellanos ran for 1,307 yards and 14 touchdowns. He also added another 120 yards and a score on the ground during his lone season at UCF, and that was with him only playing 61 total snaps. In other words, he’s a dangerous runner, and emulating that type of impact as a rusher is difficult to do in practice.
With that being said, Alabama has the perfect candidate in Jaylen Mbakwe. The former five-star athlete played cornerback this past season, but has since made the move to the offensive side of the ball to play wide receiver. He does have a background as an uber-athletic, do-it-all quarterback from his high school days while standing out for Clay-Chalkville (Pinson, Ala.).
On Tuesday, Alabama veteran linebacker Deontae Lawson was asked who has been replicating Castellanos in practice on the scout team. He responded with one name: Mbakwe.
“Jaylen Mbakwe, he comes down here and gives us a couple of reps, and he is pretty shifty, so I think it’s a good scout player for us,” Lawson told reporters.
Lawson then went into a little bit more detail about what Mbakwe is bringing to the table as a scout-team quarterback.
“He just comes over here, brings some energy, tells us we can’t tackle him and things like that, just to try and get us going,” Lawson said with a smile. “But we love the looks we’ve been getting, and we’re looking forward to it throughout the week.”
Mbakwe’s best friend, Alabama wide receiver Ryan Williams, was also asked about his teammate’s performance on the scout team. He gave Mbakwe a lot of credit for putting the team first, which he says is a theme for this entire team.
“I looked over there, and he hit somebody with a fake pump and took off,” Williams said. “So I mean, you know he’s got it in him, and I’m just super proud of our guys. Everybody understanding that it takes all of us in the season in order for us to do what we want to do. And him just going over there and attacking the scout field, that’s just a testament of our guys so far.”
Those are the types of things that you want to hear, if you’re an Alabama fan. We’ve heard nothing but positive feedback when it comes to the closeness of this Crimson Tide locker room, and that will hopefully translate to Saturdays this fall. What — if anything — does this mean for Mbakwe’s role at wide receiver though?
Some thought he might be a part of the rotation. Don’t get me wrong, that could still be the case, but the more time that’s spent playing quarterback on the scout team, the less time being spent preparing to contribute at wide receiver against Florida State. So as he continues to make the transition from cornerback, you might not see him out of the gate much other than on special teams. And that’s OK. This is a process, and Mbakwe is going through that process.
For now, we’re expecting to mainly see Williams, Germie Bernard, Isaiah Horton, Rico Scott, Cole Adams and possibly Jalen Hale in the rotation. From there, the pecking order could include true freshmen Lotzeir Brooks and Derek Meadows and Mbakwe, but there’s some wiggle room and depth built in where Alabama won’t have to immediate turn to Mbakwe in the event of an injury. That gives the second-year athlete the flexibility to do things such as help out on the scout team.
