Alabama will turn to Todd Watson on an interim basis following the resignation of special teams coordinator and tight ends coach Jay Graham, head coach Nick Saban announced Wednesday. Graham put out a statement over social media earlier in the day stating he was stepping down to focus on his mental health.

“Jay made a decision to do what he did and we’re going to support him every way we can. And we certainly wish him and his family the best,” Saban said during his post-practice Zoom call with reporters. “Obviously our plan is to improvise and adjust. I think we have other people that can help coach special teams.

“Todd Watson, who was a special assistant, intern, doing special teams, we just activated him to do it for now and we’ll start a search and see if we can find the best coach. There’s no timetable for doing that. We want to really try to get the best person we can get. It’s not an ideal time, lots of people in spring practice. So we’ll just have to see how it goes and how that process ends up. We just started that a little bit today.”

Alabama hired Watson the special assistant to the head coach in early February. He comes to the Tide after spending the past seasons at Tennessee where he spent two years as the director of football operations before moving to director of football programming in his final season.

"Todd has a long history as a successful high school coach in Alabama and more recently in the college game on the operations side," Saban said at the time. "We are excited to add his knowledge and experience to our staff. Todd has always been someone we have had the upmost respect for as a person and a coach."

Prior to joining Tennessee, Watson served as the director of operations and high school Relations at Troy from 2015-17. The Trojans combined to go 20-5 over his final two seasons and shared the Sun Belt Championship with Appalachian State in 2017.

Watson was one of the most successful high school coaches in Alabama before moving to the college level. He posted a record of 80-36 in 10 seasons as the head coach at Foley High School, where he helped develop former Alabama standouts Julio Jones, D.J. Fluker and Robert Lester.

"It is an honor and a privilege to have the opportunity to work for the most-storied program in college football history," Watson said upon his hiring in February. "My family and I are excited to be back in the great state of Alabama and look forward to being on Coach Saban's staff."