Nick Saban must get Alabama football's house in order. Start with Jermaine Burton | Toppmeyer

In response to Alabama football's first loss to rival Tennessee in Nick Saban’s tenure, the Crimson Tide coach shared with his players a metaphor.

He spoke of a carpenter using a special light to evaluate whether the wood is exactly how he wants it or bears any flaws.

That, in Saban’s metaphor, is what Alabama’s opponents are doing: Examining the Tide for flaws to exploit.

I see it differently. No special light is necessary to reveal what ails Alabama. Just flip on the overhead, and you’ll see warped wood everywhere.

Alabama (6-1, 3-1 SEC) continues to play like an undisciplined team, and the bill came due against Tennessee. The Vols, in a 52-49 upset of the Tide, capitalized on 17 Alabama penalties for a whopping 130 yards.

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For Alabama to rebound and reach the College Football Playoff, Saban must get his house in order. He sounds willing to make some lineup adjustments.

“We can’t continue to tolerate guys that aren’t doing the things they need to do to be successful,” Saban said.

Sounds like a good idea.

If Saban is serious about that plan, I would start by parking wide receiver Jermaine Burton on the bench for at least Saturday’s game against Mississippi State after Alabama’s lack of discipline at Tennessee spilled into its postgame exit amid a field-storming.

A Tennessee student, in a social media post, accused Burton of "smacking" her in the head while she ran onto the field to celebrate the Vols’ last-second victory.

The woman posted a video that, while shot from a distance, appeared to support her claim of the incident. The woman who made the accusation confirmed to Outkick that she's the woman in the video.

“We are aware of the situation with Jermaine Burton as he was exiting the field Saturday,” Saban said in a statement Wednesday. “We are currently working to gather more information.”

No police report had been filed with Knoxville police or UT police as of Wednesday afternoon.

Field stormings are wild and unpredictable, and anyone who rushes that playing surface does so under the risk of injury. But the woman in the video sidestepped to get out of Burton’s way, and there was no reason why he couldn’t have continued walking to the locker room without incident.

The video shows that Burton, a transfer from Georgia in his first season with the Tide, turned and raised his right arm and appeared to make contact with the woman as she ran past him. The woman paused, grabbed her head and turned to look back at Burton before continuing.

“We certainly don’t condone any mistreatment of anybody, whether they should or shouldn’t be there (on the field),” Saban said Wednesday on the SEC teleconference. “I think you’ve got to have respect for other people. But, at the same time, it’s a difficult situation for all of us.”

The lack of postgame exit discipline is befitting of a team that leads the nation in total penalties.

Yes, that’s right, a team led by the greatest coach ever ranks 131st out of 131 FBS teams for penalties.

These aren’t all judgment pass interference calls or debatable flags for holding. Alabama is piling up the flags for offsides, false starts, face masks and more.

Neyland Stadium was a menacing environment Saturday, but this is becoming par for the course for Alabama. It has averaged 14 penalties per game in three road games, while averaging six penalties in home games.

On Saturday, Alabama had nine penalties on offense, six on defense and two on special teams.

“Our players need to focus on what they have to do to be aggressive, to play winning football, regardless of what the circumstances are,” Saban said of playing in Neyland Stadium, “and I don’t think we did that great, but I think that’s something that’s our issue that we need to learn from.”

Alabama’s special teams – once a backbone of the Saban dynasty – are now a disaster, with gaffes continuing weekly, and the Tide’s wide receivers are plagued with hands of cement.

Alabama’s defensive backs proved too slow-footed to keep up with Tennessee wide receivers. Vols coach Josh Heupel kept scheming ways to get UT wide receivers into advantageous matchups, and, in a rare sight, Saban came across as being outcoached.

Despite its errors, Alabama was a 50-yard Will Reichard field goal away from beating Tennessee, a result that mostly would have been a credit to another brilliant performance from quarterback Bryce Young.

Young is a master carpenter, but his surrounding cast is damaging his handiwork.

Blake Toppmeyer is an SEC Columnist for the USA TODAY Network. Email him at BToppmeyer@gannett.com and follow him on Twitter @btoppmeyer.

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This article originally appeared on USA TODAY NETWORK: Alabama football coach Nick Saban should sit Jermaine Burton vs MSU