Forgive Alabama senior quarterback Brodie Croyle if he laughs at Sports Illustrated’s cover jinx.

You know the story. Get on the cover of Sports Illustrated, as Croyle and the rising Crimson Tide did last week, and bad things start to happen.

The reason Croyle doesn’t worry about it is that there’s not much more out there bad that can happen to him. Since he signed with Alabama in 2001, the school has been put on NCAA probation, he has had three head coaches, he played most of the ’03 season with an ailing shoulder and he tore an anterior cruciate knee ligament last year.

So you think a little jinx is going to bother him? The adversity he’s weathered not only has made him tougher, but it’s also made him appreciative of unbeaten Alabama’s No. 6 ranking and 5-0 start this season heading into Saturday’s game at Ole Miss.

"Yeah, I would have liked to have had three SEC championships by now, and have everyone talking about a national championship," Croyle said. "But even with the coaching changes, injuries and probation, I wouldn’t trade any of those tough times for nothing."

That attitude has been a factor in Croyle’s performance this season, one that has made him a favorite, along with Georgia quarterback D.J. Shockley, to win the SEC’s Most Valuable Player award. Just behind Shockley in the league’s pass efficiency rating, Croyle has completed 76-of-126 for 1,111 yards, nine touchdowns and two interceptions.

He inspires such confidence from his teammates that someone like ’Bama defensive back Roman Harper said, "Brodie is Superman to me, and Superman can’t be taken down by anything."

Croyle has won games so this year with his arm and his legs, managing a methodical Tide offense that leads the league in time of possession at 33:45.

Against Florida’s then-No. 1 nationally ranked pass defense, he threw for 283 yards and three touchdowns in a 31-3 ’Bama runaway. Gators’ coach Urban Meyer said admiringly of Croyle, "He’s an NFL quarterback and he played like it, too."

And in a 37-14 win over South Carolina, Croyle ran for 28 yards for four carries, including a 15-yard scramble that ended with a hook slide. That’s something he didn’t do last year when he sustained his season-ending knee injury against Western Carolina, and Alabama went 3-6 the rest of the season.

"I wasn’t raised to avoid getting hit," Croyle said. My dad (John Croyle, a defensive end on Bear Bryant’s 1973 national championship Alabama team) taught me to get every yard you can get when you can get it. But after last season, I got the OK from Big John to slide."

Alabama coach Mike Shula, who just relinquished to Croyle the Alabama career TD pass record that he and Andrew Zow held, doesn’t mind if Croyle takes the low road.

"Nobody is tougher than Brodie as far as injuries go," Shula said. "But the thing I’ve always liked about him is the bigger the situation gets in a game, the slower his pulse. That’s the kind of guy you want as your leader. I enjoy talking to him during the course of a game."