Jalen Milroe reveals he was offered 'more than $2.5 million' to transfer from Alabama after Nick Saban retirement

Jalen Milroe had his fair share of offers to leave Alabama following Nick Saban’s retirement. They would have paid him handsomely, too.

Joining Closed on Sundays with Pat Surtain and Terrion Arnold, the trio of former Crimson Tide standouts discussed several topics including Saban’s abrupt retirement after the Rose Bowl loss and how he handled the coaching turnover. According to Milroe, he had some massive NIL packages offered to him during the decision-making process.

“I was offered so much money to leave, like, from any school I wanted to go to — and I’m talking about more than $2.5 million,” Milroe said. “It would have been easy to just leave, go chase that dollar sign and play one more year in college. I’m still in the process (of trying to figure out), should I declare and leave (for the NFL Draft) that year? (I had those) two things going on my mind.”

Milroe was one play away from sending Alabama to the national championship, but was stuffed by Michigan defenders just shy of the goal line. The game was held on New Year’s Day with Saban retiring nine days later.

“We just lost the Rose Bowl, one game away (from a national championship appearance). So I’m still hurt from that, because the ball is in my hand the last play of the game,” Milroe continued.

“I’m still torn behind that, and I still gotta use this poker face and walk in the building. The cut off date for the declare for the draft, the cut off date for the transfer, and then I don’t even know who our coach gonna be.”

Milroe said that each day more of his teammates entered the NCAA transfer portal. With deadlines approaching, he had to make his decision, too.

In the end, he chose to stay and play under new head coach Kalen DeBoer. DeBoer was coming off a national championship run with Washington.

The Crimson Tide finished 9-4 during DeBoer’s first season in Tuscaloosa. It was the lowest amount of wins from an Alabama team since 2007 during Saban’s first season at the helm.

“Everybody gonna criticize how we play year one under Coach DeBoer,” Milroe said. “But there’s a lot involved with that, and I thought it was the right decision at that stage.”

Milroe finished out the season with the Crimson Tide and while it ended short of the College Football Playoff, he went on to be drafted in the third round of the 2025 NFL Draft by the Seattle Seahawks. Less than a year later, and Milroe is already a Super Bowl champion.