The Aggies really need every single break they can get to topple Alabama today, and last night's injury update provided them their first one. The Texas A&M faithful have been waiting with bated breath to see if their five key players listed as questionable on the initial availability report would be ready to go in this game— and as of last night, the majority are headed in the right direction.
A&M saw DE Anto Saka, WR Mario Craver, OL Trovon Baugh, LB Daymion Sanford, and DT DJ Hicks all listed as questionable on the first report. That's a tough group to have on there, as all of them have started games for the Aggies this year— Pete Thamel chimed in late yesterday afternoon, though, and mentioned that Craver and Hicks were on track to play, which was some great news.
Fortunately, though, with the exception of Saka, all of those players have been bumped up to "probable" as of last night's update. That means that they have around a 75% chance of playing in the game as of last night. Saka is still in the "questionable" category, meaning that he has around a 50% chance to play— he'll likely be a game-time decision for the Aggies.
Texas A&M's injury report headed in the right direction, while Alabama's is not
Texas A&M is going to have to move the ball on the ground against a stingy Alabama front if they want to win this game, and Baugh will be key in those efforts. They'll also need Craver to make some noise every time he gets the ball in his hands; if they are to get any explosive plays in the passing game, no. 1 will no doubt be involved.
The other side of things here is the fact that Alabama is beginning to trend in the wrong direction at exactly the same time as the Aggies going in the right direction. Three of the Tide's players that were listed as "questionable" are now downgraded to "doubtful", including star freshman running back EJ Crowell and starting center Racin Delgatty.
Maybe the most impactful name on that list for the Tide is Zabien Brown, who is probably the best corner for Kalen DeBoer's squad. A&M has had trouble in the pass game all year, and so if Alabama is missing their top cornerback, the Aggies could be able to get more going than they have been previously.
Make no mistake, though: this is still going to be a dogfight no matter how the injury report looks for the Tide. They could be missing half of their starting lineup and the Aggies would still be in for a tough game— that's just how it goes when you're playing against a program like this on the road in the SEC.
This does help mildly, though, assuming these trends hold. Pending the Saka decision, the Aggies could be relatively healthy coming into this one, while the Tide are clearly smarting coming off of two extremely physical games— ones which they lost. A&M will have to take a similar level of physicality to Bryant-Denny today— if they do, they just might come away with the win.
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