AJ McCarron has returned to the United Football League – but not as a quarterback. The former Alabama All-American will be the head coach of the Birmingham Stallions in the 2026 season, the UFL announced on Thursday.
Until this week, McCarron was a candidate for lieutenant governor of Alabama and Skip Holtz was the coach of the Stallions. But on Tuesday, the UFL announced Holtz would not be back in Birmingham after four seasons, and, on Wednesday, McCarron ended his campaign for the state office.
“I am excited about this new opportunity with the UFL,” McCarron said in a release from the UFL. “This game has given me so much as a player, and now I am ready to give back as a coach. It’s even more special that I get to do that while representing my home state — a state that has supported me throughout my career.
“Our team will build upon the amazing legacy of Skip Holtz. I have a tremendous amount of respect for coach Holtz, what he has done for the league and for the Stallions. I am ready to put in the work that will continue producing championship wins for the city of Birmingham.”
McCarron played quarterback for the St. Louis Battlehawks in the XFL’s 2023 revival season and again in 2024 as the team transitioned to the UFL after the XFL and USFL merged to form the new spring football league.
McCarron had been out of football since he tore the anterior cruciate ligament in his right knee during a preseason game with the Atlanta Falcons on Aug. 21, 2021. After his first season with St. Louis, McCarron joined the Cincinnati Bengals for a ninth NFL season in 2023.
McCarron has no formal coaching experience.
Holtz had served as Birmingham’s coach through all four seasons of the franchise’s existence. Holtz guided the Stallions to the first two USFL championships in the 2022 and 2023 seasons and the first UFL championship in 2024. In 2025, Birmingham’s season ended one win short of the UFL Championship Game in a 44-29 defeat by the Michigan Panthers in the USFL Conference Championship Game on June 8.
Holtz’s Stallions posted a 33-7 regular-season record and went 6-1 in the playoffs.
An All-State football and baseball player at St. Paul’s Episcopal School in Mobile, McCarron was a member of three Alabama teams that won the BCS national championship. He served as the Crimson Tide’s starting quarterback for the title teams for the 2011 and 2012 seasons. McCarron won the Maxwell Award as the outstanding college player of the 2013 season, when he also was the runner-up in the balloting for the Heisman Trophy.
During his NFL career, McCarron was on the rosters of the Bengals, Buffalo Bills, Oakland Raiders, Houston Texans and Falcons.
“AJ McCarron is a part of the fabric of winning football that is woven throughout the state of Alabama,” said Russ Brandon, the UFL’s president and CEO. “It is only appropriate that a winner like AJ takes over the reins of the three-time champion Birmingham Stallions as they embark upon a new era.”
McCarron rejoins a UFL different from the one he left after the Battlehawks lost to the San Antonio Brahmas 25-15 in the XFL Conference Championship Game on June 9, 2024.
During the offseason, the league moved three of its franchises, with San Antonio, Michigan and the Memphis Showboats replaced by the Columbus Aviators, Louisville Kings and Orlando Storm.
The UFL will kick off its 10-week regular season on March 27.
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AJ McCarron Football Camp
