Kalen DeBoer has been walking through fire since he took up the job at Tuscaloosa. The Alabama regents were in deep when Nick Saban, the legendary Alabama football architect, left the building. His standard was unprecedented to match up for any new coach. But DeBoer decided to roll the dice and turned his back on Washington. Almost a year down, DeBoer continued to deal with the tough task of earning the fans’ trust. After a lot of swing throughout the season, the No. 13 Bama is almost out of the playoff bubble, a place they have never been before. It’s easy to put the hammer on the coach. But it’s not irrational. Will a potential loss against Auburn be the last nail in his $87 million contract’s coffin?

Alabama wasn’t great this season. But DeBoer has tried his best to build a solid team to fight through the opponents. After a great start early in the season, where we saw the Alabama Crimson Tide as the No. 1 in the AP poll following a bombastic Georgia win, it seemed DeBoer could really turn the tide, beating all the doubts. But it was nothing but a short-lived glimmer. The two major losses in October already cornered them on a highly competitive spree. But wait, nothing feels as awful as giving up 21 points to Oklahoma, who hadn’t beaten a Bowl Subdivision opponent in two months. No excuse left, Crimson Tide! Wake up and smell the coffee.

But if you ask, what can be worse? There’s still room for that. An Iron Bowl game against the Auburn Tigers might pull another upset on DeBoer and the Tide. Projecting that hypothesis, SEC football podcast Michael Bratton told Paul Finebaum, ”He is one more upset away from a four-loss season and I know they’re not going to do it but they should fire him if they lose to Auburn in Tuscaloosa. Go eight and four with this team. I mean, what’s the point? Bring him back next year, so he can disappoint all the fans again. I mean, that’s ridiculous. They should have been a playoff team.”

Well, in the upcoming Iron Bowl, the beleaguered team has nothing to lose except their coach. It’s what it is. They’re no longer in the conversation of a playoff berth irrespective of their future games but yes, another loss under the belt can surely wreck the lofty eight-year, $87 million contract ($10.9 million per year) of the 49-year-old coach.

However, Nick Saban, the legendary Bama figure, takes a back seat and watches over the catastrophe. Recently, he came out candid on what went wrong with the new coach and Alabama’s doomed fate.

Nick Saban took a slight jab to Kalen DeBoer 

Saban, after leaving his quintessential coaching career behind, keeps on feeding his endless football passion through broadcasting duties. His years of priceless experience got a channel to come out and bless the mix. When asked to give his thoughts on the current college football playoff reality, the phenom got one word to sum it up: ‘chaos’.

The visionary coach noted that the playoff could be a great thing to be inspired by, but the problem is that teams started to take this as their end goal. So, their performance turned purely outcome-focused, lacking the concentration to excel in the present game that they are in.

He took Alabama as an example and slammed DeBoer, saying, ‘‘You gotta beat Auburn and the Iron Bowl, and your focus needs to be on what do I have to do to play well in the game that I am playing. When you show up for the game and you think you’re just going to show up and win, it just doesn’t happen that way.”

It remains to be seen how Auburn treats DeBoer and his team amidst the sheer pressure and what awaits the ama football in the postseason mayhem.