I’m a lifelong Steelers fan that went to Ohio State, and Justin Fields is my favorite player. So when you guys drafted him, you became my second team to watch and root for. I’ve watched just about every snap Fields has taken since he got to college, and the same goes for Claypool since he got drafted by the Steelers. Because of this, I feel like I have a semi-unique perspective on the trade and thought I’d share that with all of you.
I’ll start off with Claypool. He is an immensely talented player with a ton of room to grow. Physically, Chase is a monster. He’s the closest thing we have seen to Calvin Johnson in terms of height, weight, speed. However, he doesn’t play like Megatron whatsoever. Despite his size, contested catching on deep balls is probably his biggest weakness as a player in my eyes. He doesn’t use his size and strength effectively in these situations. It feels like he manages to fall down on any pass that travels more than ~20 yards in the air and it’s maddening. He also doesn’t create much separation on deep routes despite his speed. All of that is to say, he is [not an effective deep threat](https://youtu.be/FwRutIAwKvI). However, I still love his fit on the Bears.
As I’ve hopefully illustrated, Chase shouldn’t be used in the same way someone like DK Metcalf is despite the similarities in physical profile. The way Chase can be most effective is to get the ball in his hands, and [let him utilize his physical gifts in the open field](https://twitter.com/steelersdepot/status/1586794699754348544?s=46&t=N92AW-wjj80gANRrdSewUw). Put him in motion a lot to get him open in space, and mix in [handing it to him on the sweep](https://twitter.com/steffennfl/status/1318986129014738946?s=46&t=N92AW-wjj80gANRrdSewUw) to keep the defense on their toes. He’s most effective on shorter routes, ones that have him running more horizontal than vertical, and routes that [attack the middle of the field](https://twitter.com/steelersdepot/status/1317278081556508677?s=46&t=N92AW-wjj80gANRrdSewUw) Slants, digs, outs, curls etc. and he’s great on screens as you’d expect. I actually like him best in the slot for these reasons.
Now that the bears have switched up the offensive scheme to better fit Fields’ strengths and athleticism (and thank god they finally did) I love the fit for Chase in this offense. Unlike the Steelers, you have a QB and run game the defense has to respect. They won’t be able to fully commit to Chase on a Jet Sweep the way defenses did to him on the Steelers. Think of when the Seahawks had Russell Wilson, Marshawn Lynch, and Percy Harvin and ran triple options with Harvin coming on a sweep – the Bears should run this many times a game with Fields, Herbert/Monty, and Chase. I would also like to see Getsy implement some of the modern triple option RPOs the Eagles have been running this year. Chase would be really effective as the guy running a drag or flat route if the defense is accounting for both Fields and the RB to run on the play. Using Chase in this way would open up the offense as a whole and take some pressure off of Fields.
For my Steelers perspective, I wasn’t overly eager to trade Chase but I understood it was the right business move with the state of the team and the ascension of George Pickens. In terms of the compensation my thoughts were that if it was up to me, I would consider a 4th depending on who the team was, and would take a 3rd from anyone. So I was pretty surprised to see us get a 2nd. Even if it feels like an overpay today however, I’m inclined to believe in a few years the Bears fan base will look back and be glad they made this trade. From the Bears perspective, I would rather have potentially overpaid for Chase than not traded for him. I’m really glad to see the Bears committing to Fields in the way they did this trade deadline. I still will be banging the table for them to draft a true WR1 for Fields in the first 2 rounds, but I think this trade was a great move.
Also, Fields will be a HOFer. Thank you for listening to my TED talk.
8 comments
Your last sentence is all that matters. If that comes true then it means Claypool and Mooney became a great 1-2 combo.
Another thing I want to mention- I’m sure you’ve all seen the infamous play last year against the Vikings when he was celebrating during the hurry up and lost the Steelers time. This season he has noticeably developed a sense of urgency in these situations. He definitely learned from that mistake and has already corrected it.
I don’t 100% agree with everything you said, but I upvoted you just for typing all this out and sharing your unique perspective with us.
P.S. – It is important that you don’t get Mitch wet and never feed him after midnight.
The play you linked as not effective as a deep threat is a bad example. Not saying he’s a good deep threat but that ball was severely under thrown into Double coverage where he has to slow down and completely turn around.
The funny thing is, as an ND fan I was shocked when Claypool played like he did his rookie season for y’all because in college he was used mainly for contested catches, often on literal 50/50 balls. And he was honestly pretty solid at it, so when he was a deep threat speed demon in the NFL it was immediately apparent Notre Dame’s receiving coach, who was notoriously bad, had misused him.
I think he can grow into a genuinely good physical receiver, but I don’t think it’s his preferred play style. Most of these kinds of posts are lame and don’t add much insight though but yours is well written, it’s not often someone knows the context of both teams like you. But lastly to add to your point of he’s best with the ball in his hands, ND also had him running a lot of crossing routes where he could use his athleticism to get open and then just run.
This is why I can take the valid criticisms on him and still be excited. He’s shown he can be good in pretty much all areas, he just needs more time to grow into his potential. It’s really him versus himself with how good he can be
I don’t take a whole bunch of what Steelers fans have to say about Claypool seriously cause a majority of the base didn’t care their QB was a r*pist but already want their second greatest coach of all time fired cause he’s finally had a bad season
Wasn’t it said that he was being misused in the slot? You’re the first person I’ve heard say he’s best in the slot. He also runs essentially a vertical route in the eagles TD example you posted
The perspective of the post makes sense. However- i would have expected to hear some things that Steelers did in Chases first year with Big Ben that made such a difference…bc I can only assume those yards and TDs came from deep balls. Chase has been doing slot for last year or so and the results have been poor. Can you shed any light on this?
Here’s to hoping Chase figures out coming down with those deep balls with Justin