In America, the winner takes all.

Chapter 168 Top lineup and top opponents; bench?
Freddy "Kitchen", a strong young man with a clean, youthful face, wearing a T-shirt with a huge GAP logo printed on the chest, Ethan watched the other person walking over from a distance, and the image appeared in his mind. Another name - "Rooney", he looks similar to Lu Xiaopang in stature, a bit silly, but actually has a stronger body. Such a quarterback has good impact resistance.

He also immediately spotted Ethan standing with a group of coaches. In terms of physique alone, Ethan stood out. His shoulders were wider than he imagined and he was taller than the coaches around him. He stood there like a wall, but his face was very handsome and tough, with that kind of heroic appearance, which made Freddy feel that he should be qualified to play the role of Alexander the Great in history, or It's Superman.

Freddy greeted everyone, then looked at Ethan somewhat unconfidently and shook hands with him.

"I'm impressed by your strength. You're even scarier than those linebackers and DL (defensive linemen)." He noticed the muscles in Ethan's neck.

He has naturally watched Ethan's games. He has a physique that is not inferior to that of a forward, and his speed is not inferior to that of a running back. He also has the ability to get rid of a wide receiver. The most important thing is that he can accurately guide the pass without any fuss. There is no downside to doubt.

If Kitchen was still feeling lucky when he learned that Ethan had officially entered the University of Alabama the day before yesterday, after meeting Ethan face to face, he immediately knew that he would never be able to appear as the starting quarterback again.

Ethan patted him on the back.

"No matter who coach Eugene puts on the field in the end, it is all about winning the game," secondary coach Curley Holman said.

There are only a little over ten games in college football every year. If you want to be the leader, you can't lose a game. Every game is extremely important.

In the afternoon, several more players came to the training hall.

Warren Foster, backup quarterback. J.D. Philips, No. quarterback.

Then several black teammates came to the training hall together as if they had made an appointment.

Michael Vaughn, Kevin Hall, Chad Goss, Marcel West, Shamari Buchanan, five main wide receivers, all with black skin.

The position of wide receiver requires flexible escape ability, strong jumping ability and catching skills. If the competition at the high school level is not fierce enough, there are still many white people in the WR position, then when it comes to higher competitive levels in college and professional football level, the proportion of black people in the WR position has increased significantly.

Just like the quarterbacks are all white, the WR position is generally black, and the running back position is also a similar situation.

But white people still dominate the more complex technical positions, especially quarterbacks.

"Fuck, Ethan O'Connor, you are the strongest white athlete I have ever seen, like a professional bodybuilder." Michael Vaughn and Ethan bumped fists, and several other WR teammates also punched Ethan one by one. greet.

Then there are the two main tight ends, Rod Rutledge and Patrick Happ.

Compared with the previous players, the two have higher gold content.

Rod Rutledge was Tom Brady's future teammate. Tom Brady's quarterback career began with him. He was the first person to receive a pass from Tom Brady in the NFL and was also the patriotic later. One of the main forces of the dynasty.

Patrick Happ, the same NFL professional tight end, once played for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, Denver Broncos, and Houston Texans, and will be Peyton Manning's right-hand man in the future.

As for the running back position, there are a full 6 players on the Crimson Tide team who have appearance records. It is worth mentioning that the absolute main player Sean Alexander is worth mentioning.

In 05, he was the NFL regular season MVP, rushing yards leader, and first-team All-Pro, and led the Seahawks to the Super Bowl that year. In 06, he completed a contract extension with the team. The total contract price was US$6200 million, of which US$1500 million was paid in the first year, making him the most valuable running back at the time.

But like other running backs, as a consumable on the field, Sean's career ended early due to injuries in 08.

In any case, this is the first time that Ethan has fought side by side with future top players.

In addition, Ethan's teammates also include cornerbacks Fernando Bryant, Deshia Townsend, and linebacker Dwayne Rudd, all three of whom will enter the NFL in the future.

Desia later won two Super Bowl championships with the Pittsburgh Steelers.

It can be said that the Crimson Tide has strong strength in multiple positions, and this year with the entry of Ethan, it has made up for the last shortcoming.

In fact, even without Ethan, the Crimson Tide's paper strength can be called "terrible."

But in terms of performance, there has been no improvement, and they only ranked third in the entire SEC league.

Above Alabama, there is the University of Tennessee, where Peyton Manning sits.

And above the University of Tennessee, there is also the University of Florida, which maintains an unbeatable record!This is the fourth consecutive season that Florida has won the SEC title and became the 1996 national champion.The team's quarterback is the 1996 Heisman Award winner, Danny Wuerffel.

The Heisman Trophy, needless to say, is the highest honor a college football player can receive.

In the past few days before head coach Eugene arrived at the team, Ethan and his teammates conducted run-in training under the leadership of secondary coach Curley Holman.

Relying on Ethan's personal ability, even if he has not been truly integrated into the team's tactical system, it is enough to impress his teammates.

During the defensive training the next afternoon, Ethan was double-teamed by his teammate linebacker Dwayne Rudd. He flexibly turned around and tried to bypass the opponent with a Marseille spin. However, the opponent saw through it and he directly hit Ethan. Sen hugged him across the body, but Ethan's legs seemed to have taken root on the ground, not retreating at all, let alone being knocked down.

Ethan raised his arm, and even with a person hanging on his body, he still passed the ball easily.

He pissed off all the coaches and players watching the game.

"With Ethan's physical advantage, the opponent cannot effectively interfere with the quarterback."

"We can put more players in the frontcourt, and the other team can only watch."

"Eugene must build his own tactics around Ethan!"

The special coaches communicated with each other. In their eyes, the team can completely rely on Ethan to create new tactics, and winning will become easy.

The players also expressed their disbelief. Of course, these players have also experienced the defensive pressure of Dwayne Rudd. He is the "sack king" in the team.

In fact, Dwayne Rudd will graduate and participate in the draft next year, and will be selected by the Minnesota Vikings with the 20th pick in the first round. As a linebacker, this pick is enough to prove his gold content.

But he was easily suppressed by Ethan, who seemed to be far from reaching his limit.

"As long as we can successfully enter the bowl game, the national championship is within our reach." Rod Rutledge folded his arms and couldn't help but say.

This thing is like a "dark cloud" hanging over the Crimson Tide's head, especially seeing how strong Eason is.

Just when everyone was amazed by Ethan, Ethan himself was not very satisfied.

Because facing Dwayne Rudd's one-on-one defense, he only successfully passed the ball seven times out of ten, it can be said that his "physical dominance" has been greatly reduced.

Ethan didn't know the value of Dwayne Rudd. He underestimated his teammate and overestimated the overall defensive strength of college football.

Even if there is a 99% probability of winning, it is not safe in Ethan's case, not to mention that today's passing success rate is only 70%.

"We must not give our opponents any chance. We must seize the time to train from today on!" Ethan thought when he finished training.

However, Catherine is in New Haven, Lisa is in Los Angeles, Charlize, Jennifer and others are busy with work, and the three models are also unable to get away.I have strongly suggested that Ellie choose to come to Alabama State before, but I don’t know if she will agree.

Penny Weber passed the transfer from Taili and will be stationed in Alabama for the next few years, but she is still on the west coast to take over the job and will not arrive in a few days.

The problem now is that Alabama is an unfamiliar place, and apart from Mary, she doesn’t recognize anyone of the opposite sex, let alone get to know her better.

As for Mary, after accompanying him to familiarize herself with the campus for two days, she returned to work in the admissions office and did not appear in the training hall today.

You can't drive your car to find people on the street, right?If this was discovered by local residents, it would definitely become a headline tomorrow.

Just as he was thinking about it, Ethan saw four crimson girls guarding the door of the locker room.

As the school's recruiting organization, the Crimson Girls have approximately 40 members.In addition to recruiting, each person must work part-time in the rugby office for 3 hours per week.

The four people in front of him had sent flowers to Ethan before, and they were also responsible for the preparations for the welcome ceremony. They have also been doing some clerical preparations for the team for the new season in the past few days.At this time, she was still wearing a dark red dress.

Seeing him walking out, four people immediately came up, obviously waiting for him.

"Classmate Ethan O'Connor, as the team's civilian staff, we still need to confirm some things with you. The first is the arrangement of some activities representing the school team, including interviews on Crimson Tide TV, radio talk shows, and fan club meetings. , and regarding the training time, does it need to be adjusted?" said the leader.

She seemed to stutter when she spoke, especially when Ethan was looking at her from the front at close range. Those light blue eyes made her breathe faster.

Handsome, tall, and a rugby genius, any title would make them admire him, and Ethan O'Connor superimposed these three titles together.

This kind of confirmation work usually only needs one person, and the remaining three will naturally have the opportunity to have close contact with Ethan.

After setting the time with them, Ethan then scanned the four of them.

"What are your names?" Ethan asked.

"You don't have any extra plans tonight, right? Walk around the campus with me?" Ethan then suggested.

But except for one person who nodded, the other three people all said that it was no coincidence that something happened tonight.

"Are you sure you don't want to come with me? The campus is too empty now, and I've been very lonely these days." Ethan looked at the people again, slightly distressed.

Seeing Ethan's slightly expectant look, the other two consciousnesses even felt a little dizzy, and then changed their minds.

As for the last one, seeing that the other three had agreed and not wanting to be the only exception, he could only nod along and changed his plan temporarily.

Ethan waited for the four of them to change into casual clothes, and left the training hall with the four of them.

Looking at the backs of several people leaving, the young girl with a ponytail at the front desk looked a little shocked. She had seen many young players with dissolute private lives, and also knew that the crimson girl often dated reserve players.

But it’s only been a few days since he joined the team?Ethan integrated too quickly!
·
Late at night, in the dense forest of Alabama under the silver moon, a windy GT car stayed on the spot with its high beams on. A crimson girl sat in the front of the car, holding the front hood of the car with both hands, and her shadow was cast on the ground. It is long and narrow and deformed. If you identify it carefully, it looks like a "Kappa" logo.

"You must have done it on purpose." She gritted her teeth and said coquettishly. "But I make it less likely that you will be a mother." Ethan smoothed her blond hair.

"Alabama is different from California. When you get pregnant, you have to give birth. You have to be prepared to pay child support."

"Of course, I have always been generous to friends of the opposite sex." Ethan said.

"How about you take me shopping this weekend?" She looked expectant.

"No problem, as long as I have time."

"Well, mainly team training." She nodded, took the initiative to squat down, and helped Ethan clean up.

As for the other three people in the car, they were already drowsy at this time, with satisfied and tired smiles on their faces.They had some close contact with Ethan one by one before.

Ethan drove back, and the last crimson girl closed her eyes on the way back. Ethan didn't know where the other people's homes were, so he could only take the four of them back.

Early the next morning, when Mary knocked on the door of Ethan's apartment and was invited in, she was stunned when she saw several crimson girls having breakfast in the living room.

The four people's hair was messy and their spirits were a little listless. It looked like they had just woken up.

Apparently.Ethan turned a deaf ear to her words. Mary asked a few people to leave directly, and then sat across from Ethan and talked to him about the matter.

"I am also doing it for the team's performance." Ethan looked very innocent.

"Then...how did it turn out?"

"Of course the result is very good, I feel a little stronger." Ethan shrugged.

"It's just you." Looking at the well-developed muscles of Ethan's upper body, Mary smiled stiffly and didn't know what to say.

Although she didn't understand the logic behind these words, she didn't know how to stop it. Geniuses just can't be considered with normal logic, otherwise they can't be called geniuses.

Maybe this is a side effect of being too strong?She tried to imagine.

·
The same afternoon training time, the same defensive one-on-one, but this time, Ethan had a significantly higher success rate when facing Dwayne Rudd.In 45 minutes of one-on-one training, the success rate of shots was close to 8%.

"Is this the understanding of a genius?" A group of players and coaches even stopped what they were doing and watched closely.

"Yesterday, the success rate of only % of the shots was greatly improved today. Obviously Ethan was thinking about how to find Dwayne Rudd's weaknesses last night, and he did it today. Obviously, geniuses are hidden from us. Work hard wherever you go,” Curley Holman whispered.

Then he looked at the other players and said with a bit of hatred: "Look at what the most talented players are doing, and then look at yourselves, this is the gap!"

Many players, including Sean Alexander, who would become the most valuable running back in the league, scratched their heads in embarrassment.

The iron-clad facts are before people, and there is nothing to refute.

I'm afraid that among all the team members, only Dwayne, who had a hard time confronting Ethan, knew how much Ethan had changed.

When his shoulder armor hit him yesterday, Ethan would still take two steps back. After just one night, he was welded to the ground like a wall.

"I totally lost." He gasped and shook his head.

"Take a break for half an hour," quarterbacks coach Randy Ross said, not far away.

Ethan turned around and walked out of the court, and the four crimson girls who had been lying on the railing on the second floor of the training hall to watch all this immediately rushed down, holding towels, water bottles, and nutritional shakes to surround Ethan. Sen was brought into the training hall by four people.

When the players saw Ethan being fed water through the glass, they suddenly felt that the Gatorade in their cups didn't taste good.

Speaking of which, a very few of the current team members were recruited by one of the four, but that was two years ago. Watching the crimson girl who was once passionate about him switch to Ethan's arms, naturally he felt so I'm a little bit unhappy, but I can't say anything. After all, Ethan is much better than him in terms of technology, body, appearance, potential and even money.

If you imagine yourself as a crimson girl, you would also want to attract Ethan's attention.

As for the coaches present, they looked at each other and couldn't help laughing.

In a land where college football is crazy, Ethan's four-year college career was obviously very happy...

But no one noticed that Ethan disappeared with one of the crimson girls.

No one thought much about it, but Ethan led the other party to the storage room in the training hall.

Various training equipment are placed here, and the space is a bit narrow.

"What do you want to do?" said a girl named Julia Stewart with a smile. She has copper-colored hair similar to that of the model worker sister, and her face is also very similar to the model worker sister.

Although she said "This is not good" and "Someone will come", she was already lying down.

Half an hour later, Ethan returned to the training venue, while Julia came back after a while, looking a little hesitant in her steps.

"My legs are weak, God, he is so good." She sneered and said to her three companions.

At this time, Ethan looked at Dwayne again.

Dwayne, who was talking to his teammates, felt a chill in his back.

"How about we train for another 45 minutes?" Ethan suggested with a smile.

But this time, whether it was because Dwayne was exhausted or because Ethan's strength had grown too fast, the success rate of his shots had improved again.

And through two comparisons, combined with previous experiences, Ethan also learned some tricks...

In order to verify, Ethan specifically asked Dwayne to wait for him for another half hour.

But this time when Ethan came back, he saw that everyone had gathered, and right in front of them, stood a middle-aged man wearing a short-sleeved shirt and a dark red tie.

Obviously, he is the team's head coach, Eugene Sterlings.

"Ethan O'Connor, where were you during training?" he asked immediately.

"I... have a stomachache." Ethan said.

"Why don't you explain the situation to the second-level coach when you have a stomachache? It won't happen again." He waved his hand and let Ethan enter the team.

Then he put his hands behind his back and continued to say to everyone: "Now, including me, the entire coaching staff is under tremendous pressure. The University of Tennessee introduced Peyton Manning last year, and Florida still maintains a hot momentum, including Arkansas State, who is in the Western Conference with us, these teams all defeated us last year, and even in the final round at Auburn, we also lost the game because of too many mistakes."

"Last year the Associated Press and the Coaches Association ranked us 21st, which is a very shameful number for us."

"This is also the first time in the past 20 years that we have fallen outside the top 20."

"I once suggested that Bob Boone strengthen the recruitment of forwards and wide receivers when transferring. My list of suggestions was also based on these two positions, but it seems that Boone invested all his limited recruiting budget in one What a stupid decision for a quarterback!"

The head coach looked a little angry.

His relationship with Boone was not good, and the two sides had many disagreements.

This is also the main point where fans attack Boone.Boone's relationship with coaches not just in football but in several other team sports is no better.

And why Boone chose to spend a lot of money to introduce Ethan, naturally he also had his considerations.

Aside from the personal factor of actually admiring Ethan enough to risk everything to bring him to Alabama.Also because the University of Tennessee unexpectedly intercepted Peyton Manning from the University of Michigan last year, which earned the University of Tennessee a lot of attention. He obviously wants to follow this model and bring more attention to the team. Ethan, who was in the same position and was smaller than Payton, naturally became his best choice.

But Eugene had something completely different in mind.

This year is his seventh season coaching at Alabama, and it is also the year when his contract expires. Whether he can successfully renew the contract and how much the school can offer for the renewal all depends on his performance this season.

And even if he doesn't stay in Alabama, when negotiating a new contract with his new owner, his results this season are still crucial.

For this reason, he began to ask the recruiting coordinator to pay attention to the positions of wide receivers and forwards as early as the first half of the year. When the team is restricted, recruiting resources should be spent on the cutting edge.

Just when he was full of expectations and waiting for Boone to bring him the ideal person, he waited until Ethan O'Connor!

What can he do if he comes?The team already has three QBs.

Unlike other positions, the development of QB requires a lot of games to feed, and very few can become the starting quarterback in their freshman year.

Even Peyton Manning spent the first four games on the bench last year, only to be called upon when the main quarterback injured his wrist.

"Ethan O'Connor, I have no intention of targeting you. I know that you are also full of longing to show off your skills in the college arena, and you are very capable. In terms of recruitment, it is a conflict between me and the sports director. You are innocent. But I still want to say that I will not use you as the starting quarterback at the beginning, but I will need you to adapt to the environment of the college game first. I hope you can understand that this is not to kill you, but to This is to protect you, and we need you to lead the team to better results this season." Eugene looked at Ethan in the crowd.

He really didn't think about targeting Ethan. Even if he didn't have the wide receivers and forwards he wanted, Ethan could grow up quickly and also improve the team.

"Coach Sterlings, I have % trust in you." Ethan nodded immediately.

Eugene's last words can be regarded as a promise.

"You can understand my thoughts, and this is the best. But in view of your extraordinary physical fitness, I am ready to arrange for you to occupy a special position..." He then suggested.

(End of this chapter)