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ESPN's Zubin Mehenti spoke Monday night to the 1st & 10 Club at the Mobile Marriott. (Creg Stephenson/cstephenson@al.com)

Jalen Hurts ended up being a natural choice as top-ranked Alabama's starting quarterback, ESPN's Zubin Mehenti said Monday.

Mehenti was this week's guest speaker for the 1st & 10 Club meeting at the Mobile Marriott. He said that Hurts' experience as Alabama's scout team quarterback leading into last year's national championship game against Clemson, combined with his background as a high school coach's son played a big role in his winning the Crimson Tide's starting job as a true freshman this fall.

"What I think has been a huge factor with Jalen Hurts since he arrived on campus is, just taking advantage of your opportunities," said Mehenti, who has covered college football for ESPN since 2011. "When he got to campus Jan. 2 and he had the chance to imitate DeShaun Watson, not only did he do a good job of getting Alabama ready -- although Watson played pretty well that game -- what he did was, he put a bug in the coaches' ear that 'I'm here.' Bateman has more experience, Barnett's probably the highest recruited quarterback in the Saban era, but 'I'm here.' Those other guys are Elite 11, high school all-star games ... but 'I'm here. I'm going to make a couple of bad throws, and some leads are going to get away from me and I'm probably going to make some errant throws, but I'm going to show you some flashes of brilliance.' And coach Saban has a lot of institutional intellectual memory. He's not just going to go to spring ball and say 'everybody starts over.' He's going to take that experience from January and use that, and see if he can build on it."

As Mehenti noted, Hurts did not get off to a memorable start when he first got into the game in the Crimson Tide's season-opener with USC. Then again, neither did this year's college football "it" quarterback, Louisville's Lamar Jackson.

"Remember, Hurts' first snap was a fumble," Hurts said. "Might I remind you, Lamar Jackson's first snap in college was an interception against Auburn. So sometimes you just have to wait and give somebody an opportunity. ... He was coached (at Houston's Channelview High School) by his father. No one's a tougher coach on you than your father. And wouldn't it be this guy's luck, after being coached by your father, you'd think anybody other than your father would be easier to handle, he gets Nick Saban."

On the other side of the state, Auburn meets LSU in what might be a must-win game for both teams and head coaches. As Mehenti noted, it's "it's hot seat vs. scalding hot seat, or scalding hot seat vs. hot seat" when Gus Malzahn and Les Miles match wits Saturday night in Auburn.

Mehenti said that in terms of national perception, it's a little baffling that Auburn continues to have offensive and quarterback issues. That shouldn't be happening given Malzahn's reputation, he said.

"I think he's in a situation where it's a little strange," Mehenti said. "Their defense is fine. But the supposed offensive whiz kid can't figure out what to do on offense. If you watch Last Chance U., I wouldn't feel all that confident about John Franklin being my quarterback. He might be hyped, he might have the Florida State pedigree, but not everyone is going to have the Jake Coker Florida State pedigree. I think Franklin is a risky proposition. White is probably the more known commodity, and I don't think they can go to anybody else because I don't think that would work. I don't think the team would accept that, especially after last season.

"But I've always found it odd that a guy who changed offense in this particular league -- I'm not saying he's the modern-day (Steve) Spurrier, but he changed a lot of things -- is having so much trouble doing the one thing he was hired for, and the one thing he's best known for."

Mehenti also addressed several other topics, including:

Les Miles, and the state of SEC quarterbacks

LSU has the biggest confounding problem in all of college football. How can you put (players) in the NFL at every position, including punter, and you can't find an adequate quarterback? It's a problem that just makes no sense. You've got the pick of the litter in the most fertile recruiting ground in the country, and they're having trouble finding (a quarterback) that's a moderately, marginal, acceptable answer.

"Think about where we are in the SEC -- Florida and LSU are banking on two quarterbacks for Purdue to salvage their season. Those two guys, Danny Etling and Austin Appleby, almost got Darrell Hazell fired. And now they are trying to help Florida and LSU win the SEC. But as Nick (Saban) has shown across the way, and this is all due respect to Blake and Jake and whomever is going to play quarterback for this particular team, they have shown that this is not the NFL. In the NFL, if you don't have a quarterback, you have nothing. Alabama has shown consistently ... you can win without having a dominant starter at the No. 1 position on the field. I don't know many other sports where you could not have a dominant player at the most-important position and still thrive. Again, it's another testament to what Saban is doing. I don't know many other coaches that could do that."

Alabama's sustained success under Saban

"It's the program everybody is trying to be. Everyone else is playing for second place in that particular realm. Part of that is that there is no such thing as too small of a detail to pay attention to. I think it's very difficult to convince 18-to-22-year-old people to be on their P's and Q's all the time, 365, 24-7, but if you talk to coach Saban, there's a reason they have a mental and life coach, (Kevin) Elko. That's as important as any of the physical attributes. That sounds so cliche to say that, but once you bring in 5-star (recruit) after 5-star after 5-star, that starts to get lost.

"But the reality is, they're the program everyone is trying to emulate. When you get there in any industry or profession, and everyone is chasing you -- whether it's football or business or (another) industry -- you know you're in a good spot. The other thing that most people on the outside don't think about is that they're the best team in the toughest league. This isn't like being the best team in the worst division in the NFL -- this is being the best program consistently in the closest thing we have to the NFL. He's so successful, that I think some people are starting to take it for granted."

Louisville's 63-20 rout of Florida State and the future of coach Bobby Petrino

"For Florida State, I just think they could not imagine what hit them. You just could not conceptualize and rationalize it. They scored eight touchdowns in the first half, but that was against Charlotte. Syracuse has a first-year head coach, another five touchdowns in that game, but it's Syracuse. 'We're Florida State. We came back from 22 points down against a team that Alabama couldn't beat two years in a row. We got this game.'

"Lamar Jackson in fact said last year, that he didn't know the plays. He's so athletic, that he would lock in on his first receiver and if that guy was covered, he'd take off. And look at how successful he was with such a limited institutional knowledge of their playbook. And now, you put him in a situation where he knows the plays. He's got a great playcaller -- no matter what you think about their head coach. They recruit well. You know how upset the Big 12 is that they didn't invite Louisville instead of West Virginia? You think they'd like a mulligan on that one? You know how much money Louisville puts into basketball? Football's been great.

"If this keeps up, Petrino to the SEC is not going to be far behind. That chatter is probably already blazing right now, but it's not going to be far off. Oct. 1, gigantic game at Clemson. That's it. They've got to have that game on the road. Deshaun Watson said he was having trouble getting up for games, but I don't think he'll have that problem on Oct. 1."