When building Alabama football's wide receiver room , Kalen DeBoer turns into an NBA general manager who knows exactly what he wants out of his starting five.
DeBoer's ideal wide receiver room is like a basketball team: a point guard in the slot, a shooting guard or small forward as a versatile mismatch both inside and outside, a power forward or center as a high-pointing, deep-ball threat.
Each has a different body type. Each brings different strengths for different areas of the field. But each has a common attribute.
"What we want in our skill players is every guy be an explosive threat," Alabama 's head coach said.
DeBoer's receivers may not fit in the same box. But the intangibles remain the same: extremely fast and shifty, extremely strong, a track record of production and a mindset centered around development.
DeBoer wants playmakers at wide receiver.
When Alabama's 2025 commits Caleb Cunningham and Lotzeir Brooks each described themselves as wide receivers, playmakers was the word they each used.
"I'm a playmaker, for sure."
It doesn't take long for Cunningham to show that on the practice field, lining up against a Choctaw County ( Mississippi ) High School football cornerback, stepping left before exploding right on a slant with a cornerback still near the line of scrimmage.
"He's a safety net, for sure," Choctaw County coach Dillon Mitchell said. "You can call simple plays and he does big things with the ball."
The route doesn't matter to Cunningham. It could be a hitch, a go or an end around out of the backfield. Cunningham's mindset remains the same.
"I call myself a humble beast, for sure. I'm going to do me," Cunningham said. "I'm not going to listen to all the rah-rah. When it's time to lock in, I lock in and get to work."
A 6-foot-1, 190-pound prospect, Cunningham had 1,138 receiving yards and 14 touchdowns for Choctaw County in 2023, per 247Sports. He is the No. 14 player in the country and the second-ranked wide receiver in the 2025 class.
Cunningham was a receiver that Alabama very nearly did not have the chance to pursue.
After Nick Saban's retirement, Cunningham admitted Alabama was not even in his top 12; that is, until he first met wide receivers coach JaMarcus Shephard .
"His energy, it tops everything," Cunningham said. "He's a dog. He got that dog in him. He coaches his guys hard."
Cunningham is now all in on Alabama, which has a a staff, he said, that "knows football" and an offense, he said, that "knows how to get guys open."
And plans for Cunningham are already in the works.
"They ready for me to get there," Cunningham said. "They can use me in a lot of ways. So I could really come in and start as a freshman. I just got to come in, learn everything and just keep working."
Cunningham knows Alabama can use a playmaker like him. It's what caught his attention. It's also something that is not a given.
"He also understands that he's got a lot of work to do, that he's got to earn that and he's eager to prove that and prove himself," Mitchell said.
Cunningham knows what it takes to be a playmaker.
When he takes the practice field for the first time in Tuscaloosa for summer workouts, Cunningham already has his approach locked and loaded, the same one that left the Choctaw County cornerback floored on Cunningham's slant route.
"When we out there on the field," Cunningham said, "I just act like I've been there before."
"Playmaker."
Brooks just wants the ball in his hands. It's an expectation.
"All my life, I've been a competitor," Brooks said. "I just wanted to be the best of where I'm at."
At Millville High School, Brooks has been the best, breaking New Jersey state record after New Jersey state record, quickly becoming the best high school receiver the state has ever produced with 4,009 career receiving yards and 60 touchdown receptions.
But to the 5-9, 170-pound prospect, being the best is the expectation. It's not something to talk about.
"You see how Travis Hunter presents himself," Millville football coach Humberto Ayala said. "He's like, 'I like to fish, play video games. I don't go out.' You know, that's (Brooks)."
To Ayala, Brooks is a play-making, shifty, dynamic tool for Millville's offense that treats him "like a Deebo Samuel ."
Brooks was a prospect Saban adored, leading to an Alabama offer Brooks said "came out of nowhere" from a program that Brooks and many others didn't expect to look at him.
"People truly didn't believe, like when he got the Alabama offer, they were just like, 'Ah whatever,'" Ayala said. "Once he actually got committed to Alabama, and then he got exposed and people across the country started seeing his film and seeing what he's been doing and seeing who he is, people are like, 'Oh, he's a dude.'"
Brooks' commitment to Alabama was no guarantee.
After wanting to commit to the Crimson Tide under Saban, Brooks said Alabama turned into a program he didn't want to play for anymore under a DeBoer staff that did not offer him when some of those same coaches were at Washington .
But DeBoer and Shephard trusted Saban's recruiting board.
"When they popped the film in, it was enough said for them," Ayala said.
And Brooks soon trusted DeBoer and Shephard, whom he calls his "uncle." After committing to Alabama in April, Brooks will officially join the Crimson Tide in January and play for a coaching staff that sees him as a Jaylen Waddle-esque playmaker in any route asked.
It's something Ayala and Alabama both can already picture.
"They have plans for him already prior to going in there," Ayala said. "The plan of seeing him and Ryan Williams and some of these other guys alongside each other just gives them a vision of how dynamic their receiving corps can be."
Shephard knows exactly what he wants out of an Alabama wide receiver. It's what Rondale Moore , Rome Odunze and Williams each had in common.
"To me, it's about can you learn? How well do you learn? Can you make people miss?" Shephard said. "And those guys did that at a high level."
Size doesn't matter. Odunze was a 6-3 Washington receiver. Williams is a 6-1 Alabama receiver. Moore was a 5-9 Purdue receiver. Each had their different strengths for different areas of the field. Each brought something different to the starting five.
It's a starting five Brooks and Cunningham are both on track to enter.
Colin Gay covers Alabama football for The Tuscaloosa News, part of the USA TODAY Network. Reach him at cgay@gannett.com or follow him @_ColinGay on X, formerly known as Twitter.
This article originally appeared on The Tuscaloosa News: How Alabama football is building 2025 wide receiver room
