TUSCALOOSA, Ala. — There are assistant coaches, support staffers and video cameras observing every single move, but University of Alabama coach Nick Saban has another way of knowing how much effort each player gives during practices.

Alabama is one of a handful of college football programs, including Florida State, LSU and Kentucky, to use Catapult monitoring services, which claims to be able to measure performance on a practice field.

Saban talked about the technology, which approximately one fourth of the teams in the National Football League utilize, when fielding a question about the offensive line and how reserves like sophomore tackle Grant Hill, sophomore guard Alphonse Taylor and redshirt freshman guard Bradley Bozeman need to keep progressing even though they’re not starting.

“(It’s) like having a GPS,” he described. “How explosive are you? It gives a number. And then how many explosive moves to you have and what’s your average to that number. So it really pretty much tells if you’re giving 100 percent or not. You know the guys who play practice to that level a little bit more than the guys who don’t. Not in everyone’s case, but lots of cases.

“It’s because people allow external factors … I look at the DBs, when they’re covering a good receiver their numbers are higher. When they’re covering a guy who’s not as fast they’re not as good. All of these things mean that you’re not controlling what you do. You’re letting something else control what you do. All right I’m going to work hard because I’m going to play, but I’m not going to work as hard if I’m not going to play. So you’re letting that control what you do, but you’re one play away from being in the game.

“It’s almost like running a 40-yard dash just as fast enough to beat the guy next to you. So he’s putting a whole self-imposed limitation on you based on how fast he runs rather than you running as fast as you can run and trying to set the world record. I don’t think you’ll ever set the word record doing that, if that’s your mindset. So that’s the challenge for all the guys that, hey, it’s easy for the guys who are going to play to work hard and get prepared to play, but we need the other guys to do the same thing because that’s what’s going to improve them, and when they get an opportunity they’ll be able to take advantage of it. Guys like Grant Hill and Bradley Bozeman, they do that.”

With better depth Alabama has been able to have more situational roles and rotate in more defensive players, especially the linemen. The bigger the player the closer the coaches keep an eye on his workload and how many snaps taken during a game in an effort to keep everyone fresh.

That, along with more diversity in the types of players and experience, helps explain how 12 different players have notched at least a partial sack, with reserve linebacker Ryan Anderson second on the Crimson Tide with three behind senior Xzavier Dickson’s 5½.

It’ll be something to watch Saturday at Tennessee (7:30 p.m. ET, ESPN2), especially with the Vols having injury concerns on the offensive line and at quarterback.

“I feel like we’re a very unique pass rush front,” sophomore defensive end Jonathan Allen said. “You really just can’t key in on one guy or what one guy does.”