No one has ever denied Jermaine Burton’s talent, and he put it on display while playing wide receiver at both Alabama and Georgia the last four seasons.

Burton was selected in the third round (No. 80 overall) by the Cincinnati Bengals in the 2024 NFL draft Friday night. He was the sixth Alabama player off the board this year, the second offensive player.

The 6-foot, 200-pound Burton totaled 79 receptions for 1,475 yards and 15 touchdowns with the Crimson Tide the last two seasons after transferring from Georgia, where he won a national championship in 2021. But it was off-field concerns that limited Burton’s level of success in college, and might have caused his draft stock to drop somewhat.

Former Alabama coach Nick Saban addressed those issues after Burton was drafted on Friday.

“He is a tremendous competitor,” Saban said on ABC’s NFL draft coverage. “He’s got great quickness. He’s got really good speed. He can come in and out of a break. He can beat man-to-man.

“I really, really like this guy, (but) the No. 1 thing that he needs to do — and I think emotional maturity is the best way to say it — is do the right things all the time. He does the right things on the field. He knows the importance of what he has to do in the field. He wants to be a player. That’s all he thinks about.

“But you’ve got to do the right things in your life all the time so that you can do the best things that you can do on the field and be the best you can do. … When you get emotional, you make bad decisions and lose your brain.”

Burton was the third Alabama player drafted on Friday, after cornerback Kool-Aid McKinstry (Saints) and linebacker Chris Braswell (Buccaneers) both went in the second round. Offensive tackle JC Latham (Titans), linebacker Dallas Turner (Vikings) and cornerback Terrion Arnold (Lions) were selected in the first round on Thursday.