Alabama impressed North Carolina tight end commitment Marshall Pritchett last weekend. Here’s the latest on his recruitment.
Three-star tight end Marshall Pritchett of Rabun Gap (Ga.) Rabun Gap-Nacoochee School quietly visited Alabama last Saturday evening for the Georgia game. Pritchett has been committed to North Carolina since March, but the Tide have continued to recruit him.
He spoke with 247Sports about his Alabama visit and the status of his recruitment.
“To start off, it was an incredible day from start to finish,” Pritchett said.
‘I’ve always been smaller’: After adding almost 20 pounds, Parker Brailsford is shining at center for Alabama
Parker Brailsford was once viewed to be too small, even by his own coach. Since transferring to Alabama, he’s added almost 20 pounds of muscle and has been key to the Crimson Tide’s 4-0 start.
Chris Kapilovic is standing inside Alabama’s football facility after practice on Wednesday, telling stories about one of Alabama’s star players. He has an admission to make: a few years back, he played the role of a naysayer.
While at Michigan State, Kapilovic recruited a 6-foot-2, 265-pound offensive line prospect out of Scottsdale, Ariz. He loved the kid, his competitive attitude, the technique he used. Kapilovic thought he may have found a future star.
Except …
“I was one of the dumb guys that was worried if he’d be big enough,” Kapilovic said, “and didn’t really go full throttle at the end.”
That kid? Parker Brailsford.
“Then you’re watching him in the national championship game and he’s playing at 270,” Kapilovic continued, laughing. “I always liked him and knew he was special.”
Alabama center Parker Brailsford during practice October 2, 2024 in Tuscaloosa. (Photo: University of Alabama)
Brailsford is now Alabama’s starting center. He was one of the Washington transfers that followed Kalen DeBoer to Alabama last January. Four games into the 2024 season, he is bigger, stronger, and has more than lived up to his All-American pedigree.
In 109 pass-blocking snaps this season, Brailsford has allowed zero pressures, per Pro Football Focus. That’s no quarterback hits, hurries, or sacks allowed. He is one of just eight centers in the country to allow none while playing at least 100 pass-block snaps.
Best of all, the snap exchanges have largely been good between Brailsford and Jalen Milroe. There were a couple high snaps in Alabama’s season-opener against Western Kentucky and a fumble against South Florida, but otherwise, it’s been smooth-sailing (minus the whole helmet thing).
“He’s a tremendous athlete,” Kapilovic added. “Him and Jonathan Cooper” — the seventh overall pick in the 2013 NFL Draft, who Kapilovic coached at North Carolina —”are probably the two most athletic guys I’ve ever coached.”
“He’s a competitor,” he continued. “He’s a lot stronger than you would think he is just looking at his size. He can get in there and really do a good job.”
Brailsford’s size was largely the reason he only earned 13 college offers while in high school, and only eight from Power 4 programs. Kapilovic wasn’t the only one who was worried about how it would translate. One 247Sports scout wrote that Brailsford was “shorter in stature” and could “continue to improve overall strength.”
“I’ve always been smaller,” Brailsford said this week. “It’s definitely motivation. But really, it was about proving it to myself more than proving it to anybody else.
“People probably saw me and thought, ‘Oh, he’s just 270, I’m just going to bull rush him.’ I’m like, it don’t really work like that.”
He made up for it with exceptional technique — “Technique is more important than anything,” Brailsford said. The same scout that questioned his size also wrote that Brailsford displays “very good footwork … comfort level in pass protection and on run plays … agile out of his stance … maintains leverage through contact.”
“You talk about quick hands, you talk about a quick pop-pop — it’s crazy,” added LT Overton, the Bandit/defensive end who leads the Tide with 15 pressures this season. “I have never seen hands like that before.”
Brailsford joined Washington as a 3-star recruit. After redshirting, he became the starting center and helped the Huskies go 14-1, win the Pac-12, and reach the national title game last season. He was named a Freshman All-American, and the Huskies won the Joe Moore Award, given annually to the best offensive line in college football.
“Parker, he’s a technician,” Alabama defensive tackle Tim Keenan III said. “He ain’t gonna say too much, but you can tell by the way he plays, he’s really sound. When he first got here back in the spring, I would watch him and I was like, ‘Man, this is some good work.’ Then when I found out he was the No. 1 center, I mean, what a blessing.”
Since coming to Alabama, Brailsford has bulked up, most all of it muscle. Last year at Washington, he was listed at 275. This year, 290. It was a necessary add ahead of playing in the SEC, Kapilovic said, and it’s paying dividends this season.
“Some of it is the wear and tear of the game,” Kapilovic said. “It also allows him to anchor in. When he’s blocking 340-pound guys inside, they aren’t pushing him into the backfield, or if they’re trying to pull and snatch, he’s not flying around out there.”
In addition to extra muscle, Brailsford is playing with a mean streak he didn’t always show last season. That’s according to Cole Cubelic, an SEC Network analyst and chairman of the Joe Moore Award voting committee.
“I watched Parker Brailsford a lot last year,” Cubelic said recently on his Cube Show podcast. “Good football player. Good technique, fundamentals, he knew angles. He understood the game. He did not have the kind of (stuff) in him that he has right now.”
In analyzing Alabama’s 42-16 win over South Florida, Cubelic added: “South Florida has some dogs on that front seven. (Jamie Pettway) and Parker Brailsford, that was a UFC fight in that game. They might as well been in an octagon.”
Alabama center Parker Brailsford (72) during a Sept. 28, 2024 game against Georgia in Bryant-Denny Stadium. (Photo: Stuart McNair, 247Sports)
Part of that, Cubelic suggested, may be Brailsford getting to play with Tyler Booker, the Crimson Tide’s All-American left guard. When asked if he helped Brailsford play with some nasty, Booker just smiled. “We’re a very competitive offensive line,” he said.
Kapilovic fosters that mindset with an actual competition. Alabama’s offensive line competes to see who can record the most knockdown blocks each game. Kapilovic writes the results on the wall so everybody can see. Booker won it each of the first three weeks, but Jaeden Roberts won it last week. Winner gets a gold chain to wear.
“Being put on the ground and having to get back up, that takes something out of you every play,” Booker continued. “That’s more energy you’re exerting getting up, and less energy you’re using to play me.”
The results have been pretty good thus far. Alabama has only allowed six sacks in four games. A year ago, the Tide allowed 16 sacks through the first four games. What’s more, PFF says only three of the six sacks allowed this year are on the offensive line.
Kapilovic credits Brailsford for a lot of that. Before each play, he identifies the opposing middle linebacker and makes pre-snap protection calls. He also sees how the opposing defensive line lines up and helps with blitzes and makes adjustments as the game goes depending on what the defense is doing down-to-down.
“There’s a lot of different defenses and looks and that’s a lot of pressure on him to make the right calls to get us all going in the same direction,” Kapilovic said. “We have to be locked in and ready to go and he does a great job of that.”
Put another way: the guy who was once viewed to be too small is now making a big impact.
“There’s a lot guys looking to him to come up with a solution on where it all starts,” DeBoer said. “He’s confident that way, and those guys feel that.”
