Greg Byrne responds to whether Kalen DeBoer was right hire to follow Nick Saban

In January, Greg Byrne found himself facing the tallest task of his career. Nick Saban announced his retirement, meaning the Alabama athletics director had to replace the greatest of all time – and he landed on Kalen DeBoer as the hire.

The decision received high praise considering the job DeBoer did at Washington. He took the Huskies from a 4-8 team before his arrival to an 11-win team in Year 1 and a national championship game appearance in his second season. Michael Penix Jr. also developed into a Heisman Trophy finalist and Top-10 pick in the NFL Draft.

With the resources at Alabama, it was worth seeing how DeBoer would fare. Although he has a huge win over Georgia on his resume, losses to Vanderbilt and Tennessee appeared to change the conversation a bit. But in Byrne’s eyes, he still found the right person to replace Saban.

“Not a bit,” Byrne said on The Paul Finebaum Show when asked if anything changed his opinion on the DeBoer hire. “Listen, you’ve got to have something to talk about, right? When you’re on top, people are going to come after you all the time – it doesn’t matter if it’s us, whatever organization you want to talk about. It’s a nice position to be in, right? Do we have opportunities to get better? Yep, we do. Every year, every sport I’ve been here and been a part of, we’ve had opportunities to get better during the course of the season.

“When you go inside that locker room, when you’re out on the practice field watching these guys, when you’re in the indoor [in the] early morning, you’re seeing the commitment these young men, these coaches have. And I know our fans have been so supportive of them. I feel confident that will continue. It’s a great group of kids to go out and support and get behind.”

Greg Byrne: Alabama ‘had a plan’ for transfer portal losses

After the season – and the transition from Nick Saban to Kalen DeBoer – Alabama lost 31 players to the transfer portal. But a slew of big names remained including Jalen Milroe, Malachi Moore and Tyler Booker, among others. While Byrne acknowledged the Crimson Tide saw players leave, a plan was in place to minimize those departures, considering the unprecedented nature of the search.

“The ‘easy button’ right now is to hit the transfer portal,” Byrne said. “We lost a few – didn’t want to lose a few – but we had a plan to try to address it the best that we could, knowing that this was going to be a search like none other we’ve ever had at Alabama because of what we’re dealing with.

“It’s an easy group to get behind and support, and we appreciate the way our fans have done that and continue to do that. Goddangit, Roll Tide.”