DK’s Double Shot of Steelers: The right touch

DK’s Double Shot of Steelers: The right touch

Hey guys, I’m Dan Kawajich. He’s Chris Hack. We’re from DK Pittsburgh Sports. This is double shot of Steelers coming to you from St. Vincent College in Latroe. Day something or other of all I know is that it’s the final practice before the first preseason game. Yeah. So, whatever number that is before we get on a the two of us get on an airplane tomorrow to head to Jacksonville. Um, this was an a business-like practice. I I wouldn’t call it super eventful or anything. There was a lot of guys that the head coach was, I think, smartly uh leaving out of the session. A lot of guys, lot of guys. So, what happens is there’s opportunity for a lot of other guys. And for the offense, there’s more opportunity than there might be normally because, you know, a lot of the better guys on defense weren’t out there. That said, even in that framework, it’s getting there. It is getting there. Uh listen, for like still 11 on 111, Aaron Rogers still participated in practice today. He was one of the 19 players that are not scheduled to play Saturday. He was still one of the guys. He never stops. Yeah, he he’s It’s not just that he’s out there in uniform. He’s in like every drill. Yeah, seriously. Uh it’s it’s crazy to to see how much he’s he’s doing at at 41 years old. But uh he was still there. More uh connection between him and Roman Wilson. That’s good to see. You know, that that that’s been a big topic of of training camp. Who’s going to be this wide receiver who steps up? And not that we’re seeing anything definitive to be like, whoa, Roman is running away with that. No, no, no. But that’s probably three days in a row he’s stacked positive outputs. That’s a fair assessment. I’m probably a bigger critic of his than most. Um and skeptic is probably the better term here. He’s too new to be criticized really. Right. Um I I just you know, we’ll see what we see when we see it. But yes, these have been three g three plus days for him. Absolutely. And as as we see these and today was a padded practice. I almost didn’t expect that being the day before. I almost think of these as the normal Friday practices before a Sunday game during the season and they were in pads and there was some legitimate drill. There were some legitimate drills going on and I as soon as I saw pass protection versus pass rush I sprinted over to go watch that was on another field. Yeah. Yeah. Because it was starters versus starters on that side. You know, obviously TJ W not out there, Alex Cismith not out there, but still Nick Herbig who’s made his plenty of splash in his NFL career. Jack Sawyer who’s shown a lot more pass rush. Oh, what’s the word I’m looking for? Um he’s good. Yeah, like he’s good at the pass rush, which is why they have him also doing a lot of pass protect, not pass protection, uh drop backs into the pass coverage. One day it was pretty much all he did. Uh but he’s good. Yeah. And so watching these a scouting report Ohio State University is good. It’s like on the office Andy Andy Bernard tries to become a critic is like this painting is bad. It’s just like it’s funny like that’s that that’s our scouting report. No, but like starters versus starters as much as you can have that. But I still Derek Carman’s in it. Keanu Bettton’s in it. Ya. Black is very much in it. Oh my gosh. I don’t know how many passes he’s batted down but he is leading the team in batted passes in training camp. He’s like coming to the line of scrimmage with a telephone pole that you can wave around. Seriously, I swear when he gets his hands in the air that there it’s got to be at least 10 feet in the air. It’s crazy to see to see what he’s doing. Now, most of our discussion on this program is going to be about the offense and we’re going to dig into that pretty hard when we come back. At DK Pittsburgh Sports, we take pride in coverage that connects our city’s fans to their favorite teams. Now, that connection’s stronger than ever. Introducing our allnew state-of-the-art app. Find expert inside reporting and original podcasts. Check live box scores. Track the latest stats. Chat it up with our community of thousands of fans all in one place. The new app from DK Pittsburgh Sports. Coverage that connects. And when we’re talking about this offense, we’re talking about the Arthur Smith offense. We’re talking about something that ideally would be diversified and rhythmic. And if that seems like too many 10-centent words for for football, I’ll put it another way. They need to be able to do a lot of different things. And they need to be able to do them all well. And that was never going to happen, Chris, right at the beginning. No, it no matter how awesome the defense was, it was never going to happen where you were going to you were going to need a period where they were going to be doing a lot of the stuff that we’ve seen over the past few days, which is asking each other a lot of questions, uh, young guys talking to older guys. I just watched Roman Wilson spend a lot of extra time now with Robert Woods. Uh, that that’s and they were mostly just talking. They were about this, this, and do that, and do that. You can see with their hand motions. This offense needed that time. This offense also needs more than anything the time that it is afforded it by the offensive line. Absolutely. Pass protection is huge. And so it’s no accident that today we happen to see pass protection being worked on off to the side while the the skill positions are doing their thing. And I had a chance to to talk with Mason McCormack about that a little bit today. Uh going up against uh one-on- ons practicing uh protecting against stunts. a number of things. And so, lots of stunts. Yeah. Yeah. Which is which you don’t expect in a training camp setting. Lots of stunts. No, but I mean, but that was even one of the questions I had for him was like, is this an emphasis for you guys? And I mean, you can watch my minute and a half conversation with Mason. Uh, I saw the pass perfection, you know, drills that were going on over there. How’s that all that coming along when it comes to not just your own individual technique, but also what you guys are doing, uh, collectively as well? Yeah. Uh, we’re coming along. I mean, uh, it takes time to come together, but, uh, we don’t have much more time and it’s definitely been coming together and, uh, it’s it’s been a lot of fun competing against a really good D line every day. How much emphasis goes into I saw also not just one-on-one stuff, but also when you guys are going up against stunts, how much emphasis is that put into the type of drills you guys are going through? Is that just part for the course for you guys? Yeah, I mean that’s more football football football like, you know, it’s there’s not not a lot of times where there’s true one-on- ones with a wide open space. Um, those games are real. Those happen every every single game and both sides got to be ready to execute. So, you know, in that, you know, ve in that same vein, working with Troy Fontana right next to you. Saw one of the reps over there looks really, really good. You two just one passing the one guy off to the other one. Looks clean. Looks good. How’s that chemistry working with you two being able to work together on that kind of stuff? Awesome. I love Troy. He works his ass off. He’s done a phenomenal job. Um I couldn’t be more excited to play next to him. How important like how much are you guys putting? Like obviously run blocking is a big thing. Pass protection is pretty big too when you got a 41y old quarterback behind you. Everything’s big. I mean football’s a fickle game and you don’t know necessarily what play’s going to make it. And so we got to be on our on top of our game every snap. It’s funny that Mason McCormack has the same experience level as other guys on the line and yet I don’t know why, but we seem to be just just assuming he’s going to be fine. Did you notice that? Like, yeah, Mason. Oh, yeah. He’s just fine. Like, we get into all this in-depth analysis and me and him are guilty of this, too. Absolutely. And here’s Brick Jones and even Troy Falano who’s been terrific when he’s been out there where I analyze, oh, because he only has the 55 snaps and it’s Mason McCormick and we’re just like, eh, yeah, he’s good. He’s good. Yeah. And and it’s it’s funny because like then when you go to watch what he does in practice like seldom do you ever find him on the bad end of a rep like of course nobody bats a thousand in these settings. Sometimes he gets he gets absolutely bulldozed by Benton or or but but today he looked really well. He looked really good. Fanu and him really really did really well on a stunt when they were facing against Benton and Sawyer. And then on the other side wait for this it’s not what you think. on the other side. You would think, “Oh, Brick Jones, he’s probably No, he that’s what I did. He came over from the other field.” Just to tell you the story, he came over from the other field. He goes like this. I’m gonna imitate him. He goes, “I just I just watched I just watched Brick Jones and I’m waiting. I’m waiting for the bad. I’m waiting for the bad.” And instead, he says, “He was awesome. He was awesome.” Was the terminology used. I mean, not perfect, but Nick Herbig goes right at him and tries to do some sort of ghost move, and it’s all he has. I don’t mean to be a jerk here, but Herbig has the one move, but he he cuts to the right side. He he tried to go he didn’t do that thing where he tries to go around him. I think he tried to fake that, which is like that, and then try to actually just run through him. And Jones didn’t fall for it. Jones, he stayed in front of him. The lateral movement was good. And I mean I’m at that point you should be able to stand up Nick Herby with how big Broadick even with all the weight he’s he just needs to exist. Yeah. And that’s exactly what he did. Then whenever they were working on stunts it’s it’s Broadick and it’s Isaac Samalu right next to him. They’re facing off against Herbig and Dererick Harmon. So Herbig’s cutting to the inside. Harmon’s going to the outside. Jones picks up Herbig, passes him off to Samalo. Then when Harmon’s come around the other side, Jones picks him up perfectly. Stands up Harmon. If anything, Samoa was the one who lost because Herbig was too fast going around the ed going around to the inside and Samola didn’t get there in time. But it’s not because Jones didn’t pass his guy off uh quickly enough. It was actually a really really good session for Broadick Jones and some and sometimes all it takes is a good session or a good day to get the ball rolling in the right direction or a bad session or a bad preseason game as we saw with Broad last season. you know, when he goes out there and gets absolutely annihilated by Greg, what’s his name from the from the Bills? Greg Rouso. Greg Rouso. Oh my god. Ate him. Ate him alive. Uh but in this case, and I saw a separate set of drills. Yeah. Uh involving Broad in which Yes. It was Herbig probably about 90% of the time. And Herbig kept trying the outside move. And what broad would do, and this is smart, if you want to run to the outside, think of the old Bud Dri uh critique, which is that if you want to run down there and my quarterback’s over here, you go right ahead and expend that energy. Okay, I’m just going to stand right here in case you decide to actually go after my quarterback. And and Broad did that and did it real well. But one time, I have no idea why this occurred on from Herbig’s perspective, but the one time that he actually tried to just bull rush bull rush did not did not work out well for Nick. He he he you remember that one? Yeah, I do. Okay. I mean, he just disappeared into the golf there. So, bad days, good days, bad days, good days or whatever. But to to use the term that Chris applied earlier to Roman Wilson, you want to stack the good days. You want to just start building up little streaks and mini streaks and have them become maxi streaks. You need to see that for this offensive line. And you also need to see in turn the skill position players follow that rhythm that’s created by the line. And that’s what we’re going to get into right after this. At DK Pittsburgh Sports, we take pride in coverage that connects our city’s fans to their favorite teams. Now that connection’s stronger than ever. Introducing our all-new state-of-the-art app. Find expert inside reporting and original podcasts. Check live box scores. Track the latest stats. Chat it up with our community of thousands of fans all in one place. The new app from DK Pittsburgh Sports. Coverage that connects. Come on. Welcome back. You can have a great offensive line, which I don’t think anyone’s calling this one. You can have a great one and it won’t matter if your skill players aren’t executing. And in the Arthur Smith offense, it takes a lot of different skill players to do that. Let’s discuss that first. How many different players are going to be legitimately involved? uh a lot. I mean DK Medaf, Pat Frier, Johnny Smith, those three alone are going to get their fair share of targets. He left out Darnell. I didn’t do that. Darnell, that was not me. But I mean, it’s he’s a big dude, but he’s going to get his targets. Uh Roman Wilson, Calvin Austin, like those guys are going to get some targets, too. Scotty Miller, I I’m getting to the point, I’m not quite there yet, where I’m calling a Scotty Miller a lock for the roster. I’m just I’m I’m starting to get to that point. I’m not quite there yet. He’s doing something on the field. I’m not speaking for Chris here. This is my own point of view here that not a lot of the wide receivers on the roster can do. The whole coming back to the football, the uh what was his name that the receiver that Ben loved? Oh, uh Ryan Switzer. Ryan. He’s doing some of the Ryan Switzer stuff that you need to have done. Fans don’t get crazy about it. Nobody’s chanting for him to come over to get autographs the way they are. Medaf nonstop, by the way. Non-stop. Never stops. Like DK all the time. That’s the other one. Uh and and you have these these guys these these diverse weapons doing these different things and then at the same time Arthur Smith will be the first one to tell you that it doesn’t matter if he doesn’t get the running back play. Absolutely. I mean, listen, I I had a conversation with Arthur Smith this morning, and I’m going to have much much more on our app later uh on this evening. Um that’s the DK Pittsburgh Sports app, says the salesman. But yeah, download it for free on Apple and Android. Good 12minute conversation with Arthur Smith, and the running game is big. And the thing is is that the running game and using the running backs isn’t just one way. We talk about the wide zone stuff all the time. But listen, Arthur Smith has move has has changed his offense both in the running game and how he uses running backs out of the backfield as well. And we’re seeing that even with Kenneth Gainwell. Kenneth Gainwell is being used all over the place being, you know, lining up in the back field, lining up in the slot, lining up. Lots of passes. He’s catching passes here. But Caleb Johnson’s also going to be utilized as a weapon, not just as a guy who’s going to run on first down, run on second down. No, he’s going to be a guy who can be utilized in the passing game as well. Only if he handles his blocking assignments. I caught up with Caleb in the end zone coming off the field after this practice just a few minutes ago. Jonathan, the the adjustment from college to the pros, everything they say? Uh, or a little bit more detail. Little bit little bit more details, you know. But it’s for football. Play football just doing your thing. So, you get star struck at all early on. Come on. sometimes. Nah, no, that’s not you. Football. It’s just football. I get a little new to different type of formation stuff, but no, it’s football. Pass protection. I’m sure that’s all they’re talking about with you. Just me just working on it every day. That’s my That’s my pride. Not the chattiest young man in the fold. And no one will care. No, no one will care. He needs to run. He needs to run his rear end off. And he needs to do that beginning Saturday night, doesn’t he? Oh, yeah. I and if he can carry over anything that he did today, I think it’s going to work out because he kind of ran over Miles Killerville a little bit. Poor Miles. I I almost like I I almost feel for him because I really think that Miles wasn’t set. But you know what? If you’re a running back Yeah. Right. And you see somebody that’s not set, he should become horizontal in short order. And that’s what happened to Miles there. And Miles Kilibru is not a small human being either. He might be like in terms of just like pure like muscle to fat or whatever ratio, he might be the most buff dude on the entire team. Caleb is actually one of the guys you’d put in that that structure too. You would But I’m just saying Miles Kilibru walking around after practice and everything like once he gets the shoulder pads off and he’s got the sleeveless the guns are the guns are are being are he is the right point is it was legit. It it was it was a it was Caleb going through the line and like everything else that Caleb does, including uh including that conversation you just saw, it’s kind of like, yep, yep, I’m here. Whatever. And you know, I’m going to offense with Aaron Rogers and DK Medaf and yeah, I mean, no, I’m just I’m here. I’m doing my job. And that’s pretty much that’s I think who he is. We haven’t been around him long enough yet. Okay. But what we are seeing from him is that nothing looks like it’s overload. No, no, not at all. I I def I definitely get that. He’s only talked a few times throughout uh training camp here and it just seems like everything is just straight business with him. Yeah. Like everything’s just straight business and I don’t really get the feeling and to your point, I don’t get the feeling that that he’s being overwhelmed or overloaded at all. I I really think that he is just he feels like he’s ready. He feels like he is ready to not just be a contributor in this offense, but dare I even say he Yes. Go ahead. Cuz that’s what I’m going to say. Be the guy who ends up being being the guy at the end of the season. He has from this training camp and this is anything but a criticism. From this training camp to where he’s going to be at the end of this preseason, I can tell you right now are going to be two very different levels. He is feeling his way around. He’s getting comfortable with everything and then maybe it’s Saturday night, maybe it’s the home game, the home preseason game, okay? But he’s going to get a lot of touches. He’s going to have a chance to impress. He’s going to have a chance for the first time to feed off the Pittsburgh crowd, meaning next week. And you know, there’s so much more there, okay? And that that’s that’s that’s what I don’t want to overdo this here, okay? But you can see it. There’s so much more there once this offense really gets everything going. There is a reason why the night that I was covering the draft on on night two and I was on the southside and I had a chance before he was even drafted. I love this story to get to have conversations with multiple people about him specifically. Yeah. Before they even before they called his name. And the the way that these guys eyes just lit up whenever I mentioned him by name. They have loved this guy since before they drafted him. They’ve like there is something that they absolutely love about him and very much includes the coordinator. Yes. Yes, it does. So, listen, I I don’t want to just put too high of expectations on the guy. It’s a little late for that. Our toothpaste out of the tube here on this one. He He’s a player, Chris. He is. He looks like a player. Now, granted, still has to take a first carry in the NFL. Sure. But man, he’s got a lot of tools that will really, really work. And I can even add in another little thing. My own personal like player comp of Leon Bell is not just my own opinion. It is shared by somebody really, really important on the coaching side. Okay. Okay. Well, I’ll leave that there. I don’t happen to share it. Um, covered all of Lev’s career and I don’t But you know what? Open to being wrong all the time. That’s just the nature of this particular business. Uh we will continue or resume our business of doing this program tomorrow in our regular format. That’ll be at 4 p.m. I’ll be downtown. Chris will be in his studio and then we’re going to head out to the airport, you know, and do the uh fly to Old Jacksonville for actual semi pseudo quasi football. It’s not real football. It’s not real football, I’ve been told. Roger says. That’s right. See you guys tomorrow. whatever.

Rhythmic offense requires exactly what we’re seeing from the Steelers now

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