Editor’s note: This column has been updated to reflect that Tyler Buchner announced Thursday that he is transferring to Alabama.

We’re looking at this the wrong way. This isn’t about Alabama adding another quarterback from the spring transfer portal.

This is about the Alabama quarterback room.

More to the point: How in the world did the Tide get to this point — searching the spring transfer portal for a quarterback — after a string of 4 elite players at the most important position on the field?

From Jalen Hurts to Tua Tagovailoa to Mac Jones to Bryce Young to … Tyler Buchner?

“It’s fascinating,” an SEC coach told me last week after watching the Alabama A-Day game. “(Alabama coach) Nick (Saban) has everything — 2 and 3 of everything — except the most critical piece of all.”

But how? How did the best recruiter in all of college football somehow get to the point where he’s searching the spring portal — the 2nd of 2 portal openings, and to a greater percentage, the land of misfits and castoffs — to complete a championship-ready team?

Follow the timeline, everyone. It explains everything.

Young signed in 2020, backed up Jones and was primed to take over in 2021. He was a high school phenom at legendary Mater Dei in Santa Ana, Calif., where he broke all of JT Daniels’ school records.

Elite high school quarterbacks don’t sit and wait to play, much less sit behind a player who already has 1 year of experience in a system and has been set up to play. So while Alabama offered the top 3 quarterbacks in the 2021 class, Quinn Ewers (Texas), Caleb Williams (Oklahoma) and Drake Maye (North Carolina) weren’t signing to sit behind Young.

That left the Tide with 4-star Jalen Milroe, a dangerous and dynamic runner but a project as a passer. Then Alabama added 5-star Ty Simpson in 2022, and 2 more 4-stars (Eli Holstein and Dylan Lonergan) in 2023.

And the next thing you know, none of the 4 scholarship quarterbacks seized the moment in spring practice. Now the Tide could return to another quarterback it offered in 2021: Buchner.

If you think that irony is the final twist to this story, just hold on. Alabama lost out on Buchner to Notre Dame, whose offensive coordinator and QBs coach (Tommy Rees) is now the new OC/QBs coach at Alabama.

Buchner was a backup in 2021 and won the starting job in 2022, and has started 3 games: 2 losses to begin the season (at Ohio State, Marshall), and a come-from-behind win over South Carolina in the Gator Bowl — where he threw 3 INTs, including 2 pick-6s.

Make no mistake, Buchner committed to Alabama with the knowledge that he’s playing in 2023 — or will get every opportunity to win the job. There’s no other portal for the 2023 season.

This is Buchner’s last opportunity to transfer and play in 2023. He’s transferring to where he believes he will play.

And one more thing: Alabama isn’t bringing in another quarterback — to a room that already has 4 scholarship players, 3 in their first 2 seasons — they think isn’t better than the 4 they already have.

In other words, Alabama’s next potential starting quarterback has a career TD/INT ratio of 6/8, and has completed 58% of his passes.

This after a 7-year run of Hurts, Tagovailoa, Jones and Young averaged — that’s right, averaged — 40 TDs and 6 INTs a season. That’s a spectacular regression.

Alabama has gone from throwing 278 touchdown passes over the past 7 seasons to searching the spring portal for leftover parts and possibly signing a quarterback with more career interceptions than touchdowns.

I don’t want to be the guy who says somebody missed on 4 quarterback recruits, but somebody missed on 4 quarterback recruits. That, or somebody failed to develop 4 quarterbacks in 2 seasons and 15 spring practices.

If Garrett Nussmeier left LSU and Alabama had to appeal to the SEC to allow him to play in 2023, I’d understand adding a 5th scholarship quarterback.

If Arch Manning or Maalik Murphy left Texas, or Max Johnson left Texas A&M, a 5th scholarship quarterback at Alabama would be understandable.

But Tyler Buchner?

Maybe it will work. Maybe Buchner plays like a young Hurts and steers clear of turnovers and reaches the final month of the season playing his best ball.

Maybe he’ll develop quickly like Jones, who had a shaky start against Auburn in 2019, then played well against Michigan in a bowl game — and the following season had a Heisman Trophy-worthy performance.

Saban said after last week’s A-Day game that Alabama would add from the spring portal at any position of need.

The fact that Alabama needs a quarterback after 3 full seasons of recruiting the position is the biggest shock of all.

Not that Tyler Buchner could be the Tide’s next quarterback.