Urban Meyer uses Alabama as his example of NIL-era parity as the Tide face two straight losses

Urban Meyer has picked Alabama as his main example of how far college football's elite have come back to the pack. He made the remarks at a bad time for the Crimson Tide, who have lost two straight and now host Texas A&M on Saturday.

As HEAVY reported, the former Ohio State coach went on The Herd and said he had misread what name, image and likeness pay and the transfer portal would do to the sport. "I thought the rich would get richer," Meyer said. He now believes the opposite has happened and that the changes have created parity. He said coaches he had spoken with recently told him they could see little difference between Alabama and UCLA on film. Then he added a jab: the team running the ball better, he said, was UCLA.

Meyer framed this as a point about the whole sport, not a verdict on Alabama alone. Still, choosing the Tide matters. For most of the last two decades, Alabama was the clearest proof of a gap between the top programs and everyone else. Under Kalen DeBoer, the question is whether a roster built partly through the portal can still win games on line play and a reliable ground game. As HEAVY noted, Alabama's identity was built on exactly those things. Meyer's three national titles give his view some weight, though he offered no numbers to back the comparison.

The timing makes his remark hard to brush off. For five weeks, Alabama looked like the old Alabama. The Tide opened 5-0 and scored 248 points in those games, an average of nearly 50. That run included a 56-23 win at No. 16 Mississippi State and a 50-36 home win over Florida State. Then the scoring stopped. No. 2 Georgia won 20-17 in Tuscaloosa, and No. 14 Tennessee followed with a 26-10 win in Knoxville. Alabama scored 27 points total in those two games, fewer than it scored in any one of its first five.

What it means for Texas A&M

Alabama is 5-2 and hosts Texas A&M on Saturday, October 24, on ABC. A third straight loss would do real damage to its SEC standing. It would also give Meyer's argument the kind of evidence a single soundbite cannot. Against Georgia and Tennessee, the offense could not get anything going. Facing the Aggies will show whether that was a slump against two ranked defenses or something deeper.

The market still trusts the home side. On the board for the game, which covers 12 venues, Alabama is favored by 13.5 points. Novig prices the Tide at -113 on that number and Texas A&M at +104. The best price anywhere on the Aggies is at BetRivers, which offers a full extra point at +14.5 for -109. On the moneyline, Novig has Alabama at -525 and Texas A&M at +506. The total is 50.5, priced at -106 for the over and -102 for the under on Novig.

The venues are fairly close. Sportsbook hold runs from 3.6% to 6.4% on the moneyline, 3.8% to 6.7% on the spread and 4.3% to 7.0% on the total. Even after two losses, the market still sees Alabama as about a two-touchdown favorite at home.