Jaylen Waddle's Status "Still Relatively Up in the Air" According to Nick Saban

The Crimson Tide wide receiver returned to practice this week after being out with an ankle injury since Oct. 24

TUSCALOOSA, Ala. — While not offering an update on whether or not wide receiver Jaylen Waddle will be able to play in Monday night’s College Football Playoff National Championship game against Ohio State, Alabama coach Nick Saban gave a vague update on his current status.

Saban initially addressed the issue in his opening statement during Thursday’s availability with the media.

“I know there will probably be questions about Waddle,” Saban said. “He has been able to practice some. His status for the game is still relatively up in the air and will probably be a game day decision.”

Back on Oct. 24, Waddle suffered a high-ankle sprain as well as a fracture in the same right ankle on the opening kickoff against Tennessee. Prior to his injury, the wide receiver had totaled 557 yards on 25 catches along with four touchdowns in the first four games of the season.

Waddle returned to practice with the team on both Tuesday and Wednesday, sparking hopes amongst the fan base that he might be able to return for Monday’s game.

Saban admitted that he doesn’t know if Waddle will start, and that his medical staff is still figuring out how Waddle will respond to his initial practices with the team.

“I don’t have any crystal ball to know,” Saban said. “You know, the issue with injuries is when a guy does practice, how does he respond to the workload? Sometimes if a guy practices one day and gets sore the next, you can’t practice him the next day so you keep sort of trying to build up his workload to where he might be able to play.

“That’s a work in progress right now so you can’t predict where he might be and then other guys seem to get stronger as they — every day in practice they get a little bit better so this is something that we’re trying to evaluate but not anything that we can make any kind of prediction on at this point.”