Alabama Football Practice Dec 19, 2014

Alabama offensive linemen Dominick Jackson (76), Bradley Bozeman (75), and Alphonse Taylor (50) work through drills during Alabama football practice, Friday, Dec. 19, 2014, at the Hank Crisp Indoor Facility in Tuscaloosa, Ala. Vasha Hunt/vhunt@al.com ORG XMIT: ALBIN401

(VASHA HUNT)

Players will rotate throughout the spring, as coaches watch and evaluate all of the candidates in the mix to fill the three open spots along Alabama's offensive line.

The Tide are replacing nine offensive starters from last year's team, including left guard Arie Kouandjio, right guard Leon Brown and right tackle Austin Shepherd.

"There's a lot of guys that are going to get a lot of opportunity," Alabama coach Nick Saban said. "This is where we are. We know where we want to go. What do we have to do to get there? And let's focus on those things and work on everybody improving. I feel like there's some guys there that can be pretty good players for us."

The top candidates at guard are redshirt freshman Ross Pierschbacher, redshirt junior Alphonse Taylor, sophomore J.C. Hassenauer and redshirt sophomore Bradley Bozeman.

Saban described Pierschbacher as "a guy that we had high hopes for."

ESPN rated the 6-foot-4, 295-pound Iowa native as the third-best offensive guard in last year's recruiting class.

"Ross is a big guy from Iowa," center Ryan Kelly said. "He did a good job playing with the 2s last year, especially moving from tackle to guard. A really versatile guy. He's a big, strong guy, too. He just needs to learn a little bit more about the offense, just like any young guy. It's always evolving and kind of hard to keep up, so I'm sure he's going to bring his playbook home, like a lot of other guys are."

While Hassenaur only played in one game last year, Taylor and Bozeman both made two starts.

"We had several guys that played quite a bit of football for us last year," Saban said, also referencing senior right tackle Dominick Jackson, who saw time as a backup to Shepherd.

Jackson is the early favorite to replace Shepherd at right tackle.

Rivals rated Jackson as the second-best junior college prospect and the top junior college offensive tackle in last year's recruiting class.

The 6-foot-7, 320-pound Jackson has improved as a pass blocker, Kelly said.

"That kid's a great run blocker," Kelly said. "We knew that. Coming from his previous college's offense to now, there's a little bit change for him to pass block. [Offensive line coach Mario Cristobal] has done a great job with him because pass blocking can be one of the harder things to do. If you're big, you can run block, but [pass blocking] is where the [money] is at. He's been doing a great job and busting his butt all offseason."