Whew, man! I made it through 8 pages of this before my head started hurting!
Saban and the coaches needed to get Buchner and Simpson some live action when it mattered. Reason being, either of these 3 may be forced into duty due to injury, so those 2 needed some meaningful snaps before the tougher games. So Saban gave Milroe the day off against a team he did not feel could score on us so he could see the other QB's get a lot of reps against a semi decent defense, and all the coaches could judge. The fact is, Simpson has scarcely had any work without a Black jersey on (his lack of internal clock shows this). And Buchner played only one game since he was injured last year, and threw 3 picks in that. But Tyler played 10 games as a freshman. So based on experience and not a whole lot of separation, he is first up in the game ahead of Ty.
Well, Buchner was a train wreck. I'm not sure why and surely that is not indicative of what he showed in practice, but again, they practice with black jersey's on, or only get thudded. Bullets were flying in this game. Then Simpson came in and I though he was going to get broken in half. No pocket awareness, no internal clock and has a blind spot on his left side. The arm looks good, and he did make some throws and showed some signs of being a great passer. But he is not consistent, and he is clearly has a ways to go. And mentally it may be detrimental to his development at this point to toss him out there in this mess as the offense is still going through growing pains. There has been talk about him beating himself up and pouting. Sounds like Mac Jones. Obviously lot of people don't feel the same way about him, and saw something more that I did against USF, but that opinion must be tilted based on the immense amount of hype this kid has had since he was in high school. He's just not there yet. Reality check: Very few freshmen or redshirt freshmen get to play in a major program. Ty may be another Mac Jones. Too amped up and just could not put it together at that stage in his career. Doesn't mean he won't get there.
Look, I'm not comfortable with Milroe either, but this is just where we are, folks. Milroe has enough positives and has been in the fire enough that the staff feels the best about him being out there. He can run if the pass rush gets too bad, and let's face it, the blocking is poor at this point. The situation is not ideal, but it is what it is. And he may not be the final answer. But we can't throw out the baby with the bath water just to "move on", or whatever. That's a sure way to nosedive this season, when there are still things to play for. The rest of the team around him is just going to have to pick up their game. Perhaps sitting out a game and seeing it from a different perspective, and seeing the other QB's in real game action, was in some ways beneficial to Milroe AND to the rest of the team going forward. The Goat is still the Goat.