Lane Kiffin thanks former Alabama QB Blake Sims for helping coaching career

Lane Kiffin is quite honest about his time at Alabama. A lot of the credit goes to former head coach Nick Saban, someone who let Kiffin be the Crimson Tide’s offensive coordinator. Kiffin was then hired at Florida Atlantic before another SEC gig, Ole Miss, gave him a shot.

One person in Tuscaloosa appears to have flown under the radar, Blake Sims. Kiffin revealed on Monday at SEC Media Days he recently sent a text to Sims, thanking him for helping his career. Sims was a more mobile quarterback and got Kiffin out of his old-school style of thinking.

“Lane Kiffin said he left former Alabama QB Blake Sims a message last week telling him, ‘I just want to thank you. You probably don’t know how much you helped my career.’ Kiffin said he had been too hung up on always wanting a pro-style QB. Sims passed for 3,487 yards in 2014,” ESPN’s Chris Low said via X.

You can add 28 touchdowns to the stats Low provided in his tweet. Sims also went for 350 yards and seven scores on the ground on just 82 attempts. Alabama had a great run of quarterbacks in the years after Sims, potentially making him one of the more overall underrated players of the Saban era.

From a team perspective, Kiffin and Sims helped Alabama reach the inaugural College Football Playoff. A result many in Tuscaloosa are attempting to forget against Ohio State, Sims included, after throwing three interceptions. Still, the entire body of work was quality and one Kiffin remembers to this day.

The next two years at Alabama were then polor opposites. Jake Coker took over in 2015, a more traditional pro-style quarterback. Having Derrick Henry certainly helped but the Crimson Tide won a national championship. Next up was Jalen Hurts who did not even getting a full season of Kiffin, as he left before the Clemson rematch to take the FAU job. Another dual-threat guy and a true freshman at that.

But over a decade later, Kiffin believes Sims is the guy who helped him out. Ole Miss is likely thankful as well, getting Kiffin to unlock the full potential out of Jaxson Dart. Austin Simmons could be next, stepping into the starting role for the first time. Both of those guys can use the run game where needed and are not what you would consider a pro-style quarterback. And without Sims, Kiffin may be recruiting in a completely different way.