A Deep Dive Into The 2025 Pittsburgh Steelers

A Deep Dive Into The 2025 Pittsburgh Steelers

I don’t care if you’ve cured cancer, solved world hunger, or are the best husband in the world. Nobody will ever love you as much as Arthur Smith loves John U Smith. [Music] Welcome in everybody to the reveal of the number 19 team in my power rankings heading into the 2025 NFL season. As today we take a deep dive into the Pittsburgh Steelers, a team who hopes that their quest to add Aaron Rodgers certainly goes better than what happened in the previous two years with the New York Jets, a team that did burn me. Quite bad. We’ll see how this one ages, but very much looking forward to today’s deep dive. I do actually find the Steelers team quite fascinating despite I think the fact that I think many fans are tired of this team going nine and eight and losing early in the playoffs every single season. Um I think that outcome is very much possible for this team, but at least they really shook things up this off seasonason. A lot of moving pieces to talk about, which should make today’s deep dive pretty fun. Uh also guys, for those following the series, I’m going to be changing up the format a little bit. instead of starting right here with the full list of offseason changes. Some people had commented like, “Hey, I think that kind of spoils some stuff.” So, instead of doing it all at the forefront, I’m going to be kind of building that offseason changes graphic throughout the course of the video. So, kind of before we get into each individual segment, we’ll talk about what’s changed, did they upgrade, did they downgrade at that specific position group, and I think it’s going to flow much better. So definitely let me know in the comments down below if you like this change, if you dislike this change. It will be easy enough to go right back to the old format if you guys don’t like it. But I hope you guys enjoy this little change. But with that, that means we are going to begin these videos with the coaching and scheme breakdown, set all that up, and then get right into the roster. So let’s go about it. Before we do get started, if you could take just a second to hit that like button, it really does help me out. And of course, make sure you subscribe so you don’t miss any of these deep dives as we lead up to the number one team in my power rankings. But let’s get into the Steelers coaching staff. A very familiar one as Mike Tomlin, the longest tenur NFL head coach uh heading into year 19 here. As last year, he continued what is quite possibly the most impressive active streak in the NFL where Mike Tomlin has had 18 consecutive non-losing seasons. He’s never had a losing season as the head coach of the Pittsburgh Steelers, 18 for 18 there. Uh, and there’s been some questions in previous seasons after Big Ben retired if that was going to come. and he has continued to just raise the floor of this football team, uh, inspire confidence that this team can overachieve in many ways. But at the same time, it has almost become a tired conversation for many people. And I think there’s been this kind of lack of buzz with Mike Tomlin as a head coach, this kind of general impatience where I think a lot of people do feel like that streak is becoming maybe a little overrated in the sense that the way they go about their business here, yes, does get them to 8 and 8, 9 and 8, 10 and six, you know, when we were still playing 16 games. And there is an aspect that is impressive to that. And I still do give Mike Tomlin a ton of credit. for example, with my overall coach and culture ranking where the Steelers are inside the top five in the NFL despite being our 19th overall team with an Agrade there. And that is really what you think of with Mike Tomlin is his leadership and um just kind of taking command of the locker room and having a vision for his football team that does raise the floor. But ever since they won that Super Bowl in 2009, I mean, they weren’t able to get over the hump with Big Ben and Le’Veon Bell and Antonio Brown, the Killer Bees era. Uh, never won a Super Bowl. And in recent seasons, you know, it has been just the consistent purgatory really of going 9 and eight, getting into the playoffs, sneaking in, keeping that record alive, keeping his job, but then nobody really taking them seriously and them losing in the first round of the playoffs. And I think that’s just kind of run stale for many, many people. And, you know, Mike Tomlin for me ranks as the ninth overall head coach. I still think a lot of Mike Tomlin, but he has fallen in those rankings a little bit. And I do share some of that sentiment where I think, yeah, we have seen like the Kevin Oonnells and Matt Laflurs of the world kind of from the new era of football, these sort of scheme lord types, if you will. Maybe those guys have kind of passed up Mike Tomlin in the sense that those guys also bring a great culture to the building, but also understand the X’s and O’s of football at a really truly elite advanced level. Not that Mike Tomlin does not understand X’s and O’s. Do not take that wrong, but there are some guys, some head coaches in the league that I do think are doing this at an even higher level. Um, and it’s it’s really up to Mike Tomlin to kind of get over the hump here. and and it it’s starting to feel like the clock maybe is ticking in sort of a Andy Reid in Philadelphia type of way where maybe this does reach a point where it’s just time for a change of scenery. That can be healthy for so many people in sports in different aspects. Um, so I’m not saying that is going to happen, but if this team doesn’t maybe make the playoffs and generate some real noise this year. It could be that, okay, they got aggressive, they made some trades, they go after Aaron Rodgers, they did kind of shake some stuff up this off season to maybe change the script that has been so consistent for this Steelers team. Maybe take on a little bit more risk, but hopefully invite a little bit more upside with this team, too. I think this off season had at least a little bit of that and we’ll just have to kind of wait and see where that goes. But because Mike Tomlin does have a defensive background and this defense is ultimately going to be in his vision, I think it makes sense to uh start with the defensive coaching side of things and then we’ll talk about Arthur Smith and the offense and that’ll be a nice transition right into the roster breakdown where we of course start with the offense. But it is ultimately Terrell Austin as the defensive coordinator here. He begins his fourth season after getting promoted in 2022. Uh after working here for the Steelers under Keith Butler before that. But let’s be honest, you guys didn’t click on this video to get the hot take from me that the Steelers are good at coaching on defense. That is really what this staff is known for. It’s what they’ve done consistently over the years. I think their ability to be at least good, if not great, on defense every single year is why this non-losing season streak has been allowed to happen despite the turnover at quarterback and so many other things. So, it shouldn’t come as a surprise that the Steelers rank very favorably for their defensive coaching rankings for me in this series. They get a B+ grade, tied for seventh in pass defense coaching and an A minus grade tied for fourth in run defense coaching. So, uh, they absolutely are in good hands as far as the talent in charge of coaching this defense. I think much more interestingly, let’s talk about the scheme here in Pittsburgh where it is in so many ways a traditional defense. It has, of course, evolved over the years. It’s had to. I mean, you go back, watch any football game in 2007, 2008. Just re-watch that 2009 Super Bowl classic against Curt Warner, which even then they were, you know, kind of a modern passing game by that that time standards. But anyway, when Mike Tomman started, he was a part of an older era of football. I know it’s it can be tough to look at it that way, but the the evolution of the passing game and play action and RPOS’s and the rule changes, football today is not what it was. in 2007 it looks vastly different. So they have had to evolve in terms of how often they run nickel and some of the types of coverages they run pressing a little bit less with their cornerbacks. But in so many ways, this is a traditional defense compared to so many of today’s defenses. I would say like three quarters of the league are in some form of that two shell, call it Fangio, McDonald’s, Salah, all those coaching trees that have permeated throughout the league. Pretty much everybody wants to live in two shell and prevent big plays and rotate their safeties and all that kind of stuff. The Steelers, not so much. They run about as little quarters coverage as anybody in the league. They were at 5.5% quarters coverage last year, 6.4% cover six. Uh they do run cover two. They will rotate into cover two uh much more than they will run quarters. They ran 12% cover two, but this is at the end of the day a singlehide structured defense. They ran cover one man-to-man 30% of the time. They ran cover three almost 40% of the time. So that’s about 70% of their plays right there. Single high structured stuff. And then on top of that, we call this the Blitzburg defense. While they aren’t necessarily at the very top of the league in blitz rate, those tend to be the teams that don’t have a lot of talent and are desperate and have to blitz to get after the quarterback. They’re a little bit more balanced in that sense, but they were 12th in blitz rate last season. So, that’s kind of who they’ve been. A single high relatively blitzheavy defense. And another thing that stands out to me about the way that they call their defense is on early downs. They are not afraid to come out and get into a base 34 defense. Sidebar, their base defense was actually more of a 4-3 last year. TJ Watt actually put his hand in the dirt a lot. So, it was a 3-4 defense by personnel-wise, but it was charted as 4-3 um because it was more of a 4-3 underfront that they based out of last year for the most part, but just about uh 25% base defense last year. Again, that was 10th most in the NFL in terms of not being afraid to come out with four defensive backs on the field. Commit to stopping the run on early downs. And 30% of those base defensive calls, they blitzed, be it a cover one blitz or a cover three fiery zone. But their mentality is very much to be aggressive on early downs, to plug every gap, to play north and south, to come after opposing offenses. And I think that has had pros and cons. Like I think the downside to this is reflected in that pass defense coaching ranking where it’s just a B+ grade. It it just ranks 7th to 12th. Well, we have actually seen play action teams and smart teams come out and find holes in this defense in what has been a bit of a predictable early downs defense over the years. And if you’re going to come out in a base defense with just four defensive backs and you’re going to blitz out of those fronts, yeah, you’re going to ask a lot of your secondary and you’re going to create some holes in the second level. So, good teams are going to be able to have some game plan specific uh game, you know, big days against this defense. Now, they still finish seventh in final defensive DVOA, and once they do get you into third downs, they’re very, very good. Um, but that’s kind of the drawback, right? is that it is kind of a boom or bust style on early downs. But I also don’t hate that all the time too because all of these play actionoriented passing games, their philosophy is like, “Hey, we want you rushing east and west. We want you afraid of the run on early downs.” And the Steelers don’t play afraid of the run. They’re going to get after you. And they can um disrupt your your playaction passing game with their blitz heavy attack in in many of their games as well. But I also I don’t hate it in the sense of just get to third down. Like, okay, if it’s first down and they drop a 15 yard playaction pass over the top of your head, yeah, it might hurt your total yards allowed and your final metrics and all that stuff, but from just a um how you want to live defensively point of view, you don’t want to be in second and two. You don’t want to be in second and four. That’s the worst place to be. So play aggressive. Hopefully get you into, you know, second and eight, third and seven where you can get into your nickel defenses and know that the opponent’s going to pass. Again, I think this has its ups and downs as a philosophy, but I think it’s at least for the players, it’s a fun defense to be a part of certainly with that overall mentality. Um, but then yeah, once they do get you into third down, they are traditional as well in the sense of they run cover one, they run cover three, they will blitz out of those single high structures and that’s the world they want to live in. Now, they’ve had to get into a little bit more offzone zone match style stuff just because of the rules. You can’t be as grabby with pre-nap motion. It it can be uh tough to run a lot of press man. So, we’ve seen this be a pretty like offzone cover three match uh fire zone oriented defense in in many cases, but again, for the most part, that has really worked for them. So, there’s your kind of defensive overview. They are of course in very good hands here in Pittsburgh. Let’s talk about the offensive coaching with Arthur Smith. And Arthur Smith is one of the most memed, hated on offensive coordinators and coaches in general in the entire league. Whereas I kind of go the other way. I think he is overhated and honestly a pretty good offensive coordinator, especially for a team that is going to have a CEO/defensive-minded head coach to to have a solid mind in the building and to have a guy that isn’t going to be at risk really of getting hired as a head coach elsewhere anytime soon at least as he did fail in Atlanta as a head coach. I think that is an asset to this Steelers team and even last year despite an offensive line that was really banged up and probably in the bottom 10 and you know a QB carousel with Justin Fields who can be a frustrating quarterback to call your offense for at times because of how he sees the field and Russell Wilson who was okay you know started good and finished poor and really having George Pickkins and nobody else to throw the football to the Steelers still finished inside the top 20 in offense. last year. So, even last year, the results were there as a a team that probably outperformed their core roster talent. Um, but like he gets all this hate for what happened in Atlanta. And was he a good head coach? No. I I think he did struggle with so many of the culture building aspects that say a Mike Tomlin is so great at and it did ultimately cost him his job in Atlanta. But at the end of the day, those offenses were good in Atlanta. They by far shattered expectations based on who their quarterbacks were with Desmond Ritter and and uh Hineki and he had a year of Matt Ryan, a shell of Matt Ryan, right? I’m not confusing my timelines here. Uh he had Matt Ryan the year before uh they he went to Indianapolis where we all saw what that looked like. So he, needless to say, did not have good quarterbacks in Atlanta either. And they were still always kind of sniffing the top 12 and top 15 in in total offensive efficiency, which was really impressive. And he got so much hate because of the fantasy community with Kyle Pittz and all of his expectations, kind of frustrations with people saying, “Why are you only using Kyle Pitts as a decoy?” And I got frustrated with him at times for that, too, as a Kyle Pitts fantasy owner. But hey, looking back on it, maybe Arthur Smith was on to something in that John Smith might be the better tight end. He certainly was last year uh in Miami compared to Kyle Pittz in Atlanta without Arthur Smith there. And then yeah, some of the Bejian Robinson usage was frustrating at times. I I will give the Arthur Smith haters that. Um and not to spend too much time on what happened in Atlanta here, but like I do think the overall plan was to not overuse Bejian Robinson. Um, but I think when they used Bejian was quite frustrating. I think there were critical moments where they would go to Tyler Algier where Bejan should have been in there and that was relative criticism. So, I’m not saying the guy is perfect obviously, but generally speaking and and you go all the way back to Tennessee too where those Ryan Tanahill offenses were like top 10. So, like he has consistently performed as an offensive coordinator. And again, that that was the same last year for this team to still be top 20 as an offense. Those were solid to good results. So, I will continue to defend Arthur Smith against the haters. And I understand there’s going to be some people in the comments coming after me for that. Um, but I’m just calling it like I see it. So for the coaching rankings here for the Steelers from a runame coaching perspective, I have them sniffing the top 10 eighth to 11th with a B+ grade for run game coaching. I think that is where Arthur Smith is at his best installing his wide zonebased run game, which I will discuss the scheme a little bit further here in a second. Um, but from a pass game coaching aspect that I already would say Arthur Smith is is not as good in the pass game design as he is in the run game design. I wouldn’t say he’s poor designing his pass game, but that would have been a B minus grade, which would have been just kind of hardly around top 20. However, I do think we have to mention the Aaron Rodgers factor here. We saw this with the Jets. Their pass game design was as ancient and hard to watch really under Aaron Rogers say as any in the league last year. And I think that is the most relevant drawback of Aaron Rogers being your quarterback is he has a certain way that he wants to play offense. Specifically speaking, like force-feeding back shoulder comebacks in many ways, avoiding throws over the middle of the field. And I do think that has to be factored in here. So where they would otherwise be a Bminus grade and more inside the top 20, they do get hit a little bit for the Aaron Rogers factor. Now it’s a C++ grade for pass game coaching 22nd to 30th. I I will say that the Jets let Aaron do whatever he wanted. That’s not going to be the case here in Pittsburgh. Arthur Smith is a strong mind. Mike Tomlin is a strong mind. I think the overall philosophy of Aaron Rogers signing here on a cheap one-year deal is a bit of an acceptance that he’s going to come in and do things the Steelers way. So, I think it’s a bit of a bridge between the disaster with the Jets where it was basically just Aaron Rogers calling plays with his yes man and Nate Hackett as the offensive coordinator that the Jets literally weren’t allowed to fire because of Aaron Rogers influence on the organization. I think there’s a middle ground here where Rogers will come in and run an offense like Matt Laflur um very much forced Rogers to at least on early downs run the offense. Let Laflur call the plays. Don’t change the play at the line of scrimmage. There was so much narrative surrounding that. I think at least in Pittsburgh there’s going to be more of that. Um, and I think Rogers is more accepting of that considering he knows how badly it failed last year with him basically running the offense in New York. Um, and hell, Arthur Smith worked with Matt Laflur in Tennessee in 2018. So, that influence is very much relevant and the scheme is very much the same in many ways. At least the core principles and the terminology is going to be very much the same. So, I I don’t think it’s going to completely destroy the ability for the Steelers to have a, you know, well-called offense, but there is inevitably going to be some of those third downs where Rogers does get the power, where he probably does avoid the middle of the field, where he probably does force the ball to the outside. That is inevitably going to lead to some frustrations, which at this point is just a part of Aaron Rogers being your quarterback. So, they do get dinged a little bit for the pass game coaching certainly. Um, but let’s finish up this segment by discussing the scheme here. Uh, and it is, as I’ve hinted at, very much in the Shanahan family of those heavy personnel, wide zone, playactionoriented offenses. Um, but Arthur Smith at this point, probably more than anybody in the league, loves to run his version of this offense out of 12 and even 13 personnel. really leaning into those single back uh heavy tight end formations with two or three tight ends on the field. You know, we’ve seen all of the McVey disciples be very 11 personnel oriented offenses where they want that kind of big slot wide receiver to be your sort of extra blocker, if you will. We’ve talked in this series about the idea of 11 and a half personnel with your Cooper Cups and Jawan Jennings types of wide receivers. Kyle Shanahan himself has actually been much more of a 21 personnel style offense with the use of that fullback with Kyle Eustic, whereas again Arthur Smith wants that single back look. And whereas some teams we will say, well, this is what they’ve done in the past. Maybe they’re going to change that up this year. In the case of Arthur Smith and the Steelers, it is a full commitment to that 12 and 13 personnelbased offense. As we’ll see in just a little bit here, this offense is built to run 13 personnel. They have three tight ends now after acquiring acquiring John Smith, Arthur Smith’s guy in a trade. And then it’s really a wide receiver core with DK Metaf and a mly crew of adequacy at best. Um, so we are going to see a lot of three tight ends on the field with that running back and DK Metaf out there who he himself is built like a tight end. So they are going to come out and smash you. I would wager the Steelers are in the top five in run pass balance in favor of how much they run the ball. Aaron Rogers himself has talked about how he wants to hand the ball off a lot and I think that’s a big reason why he came here because of that commitment to the run game and I would bet my mortgage that the Pittsburgh Steelers lead the league in 13 personnel this year now going to get an extra tight end in there. They already led the league in 13 last year um by one against the Arizona Cardinals. Um, and then I would even bet the Steelers are with that also like top 10 in 12 personnel. So last year they were first in 13 personnel and 11th in 12 personnel. That is what Arthur Smith has always been about and they are not making any mistakes about it this year. So, a heavy dose of the wide zone run game. Hopefully mixing in some balance of duo and counter into that as Arthur Smith has been pretty good at having those change ups. He does call as much wide zone as anybody in the league, but he understands the kind of right time when he kind of gets lineman leaning into the wide zone. He kind of gets you going one way. He’ll he’ll mix in those counters to keep you honest and to hit hit gap runs at the right time. Um, and that’s that’s a part of the the favorable run uh run game coaching that I give Arthur Smith. He just has an excellent feel for coaching the run game and calling the run game. Um, but then of course the threat of play action off of that and having these kind of unique athletes like a John Smith is a big part of this. like they’ve got Pat Frymouth, they’ve got Washington who’s interesting, but if you’re going to come out and get teams into base defenses and play these heavy packages, you want some speed from your tight end room, you don’t want that to totally come at the compromise of run blocking, though. And that’s why he likes John Smith so much. Um, we’ll talk more about, you know, the weapons breakdown and all that, but it it ties handinhand with the scheme for sure. So, if they’re going to get get you coming up field or keying into the wide zone, play fakes really heavily, he wants a guy like a Janu Smith that can get open over the top of linebacker’s heads and pull away from linebackers and safeties even on these crossing routes. And John showed he can still do that with Miami to, you know, he had a career year in Miami last year. And, you know, Pat Frymouth and and uh Darnell Washington can do some of that stuff, too. But uh obviously he wanted that core scheme element here and he went and got it in that trade that involved also obviously Jaylen Ramsey and Ma Fitzpatrick. So there’s your Arthur Smith system and your coaching staff overall. I do think the Steelers are obviously in very good hands here. Even if there has been a little bit of a narrative that things are getting, you know, a bit stale with Mike Tomlin at the helm here, I think it’s still better to have Mike Tomlin than not. Though, I don’t totally disagree with those saying, “Hey, it might be time for a change of scenery, especially if things don’t go great here this season.” Now, before we do break this roster down, I do want to thank the sponsor for today’s deep dive, SeatGeek. the number one ticketing app for good reason. They help you guarantee you get the most bang for your buck. Their app, their user interface is fantastic. They color code every seat. They give you an image of what your seat’s going to look like. A seamless process that as long as you look for those green dots, you know you are getting the best bang for your buck. You get the tickets right in your app. Pair that with the best customer service among all the ticketing apps. You can have a stressfree approach to the gate. Go have some fun this summer, you guys. Whether you’re in Pittsburgh or like me in Minnesota, so many of us have to deal with the winter months on the horizon. Go get some sunshine. Go see a ball game. MLB, as of this recording, is beginning the second half of their season. Go have some fun. Buy your tickets on Segeek. And when you do, use code TFG10. You’ll even save up to $20 on your next purchase. You’ll support my channel in the process. And I hope you all have a fantastic time wherever it is that you are headed. All right, let’s get into the roster breakdown here. And like I said, we’re doing things differently for this episode. I want your feedback on this format change here, but as we lead into every position group, we are going to build up the offseason changes graphic. So with the quarterback here, a lot of change. Obviously, both Russell Wilson and Justin Field started games for this team last year. Both are in their own right moderate losses. They did what they could for this team last year, but not huge losses. And they go in and bring Aaron Rodgers, a major addition for this team. I do consider Rogers an upgrade over Russell Wilson, as we’ll discuss, certainly an upgrade over Justin Fields. And then they do bring Mason Rudolph back as a backup here and draft Will Howard in the sixth round who we’ll have to talk about. So I don’t consider this a major upgrade from what they had last year, but I do at least consider it slightly upgraded going to Aaron Rodgers here. And I fully understand that there is not a more hated player in the NFL than Aaron Rodgers. And I’m not blind. I’ve seen that the consensus narrative on Aaron Rogers is that he’s a washedup old man. That he sucks now. he can’t throw the football anymore and frankly that this was a bad signing for the Steelers and that this can’t work out to a degree. I understand that that’s the narrative on him and I as much as anybody understands basically the crossfire that I’m putting myself in front of defending Aaron Rogers at all at this point. But I do have eyeballs and I did watch the film. In fact, I watched all 17 Jets games last year. And you guys, I understand all the drama that comes with signing Aaron Rogers. And I already talked about the negative impact he has on your pass game design and some of the stuff that comes with his approach to quarterbacking the position. But just evaluating Aaron Rodgers in his cleats on the football field, he’s still a solid, useful starting quarterback that has traits to like at this position, even if he does have some pretty major deficiencies at this point at 41 years old. I think so many people think that Aaron Rogers is like the 40th best quarterback in the league, if not worse, and that this was a complete waste of time and a guaranteed disaster. And the film on Aaron Rogers last year just does not tell you that picture. In fact, many of the analytics and stats on Aaron Rogers would tell you that he was even better than the 21st overall quarterback, which is where I have him heading into this 2025 season at 41 years old. Um, but fifth in turnover worthy play percentage in in a good sense. 39th lowest out of 44 in a good sense, if you get what I’m saying. big-time throw percentage was still inside the top 20 right next to Matthew Stafford, CJ Strad, Trevor Lawrence, Caleb Williams, Drake May. He is still able to make some really high leverage NFL caliber throws deep down the field. Threw 28 touchdowns to 11 interceptions. He finished the season with 3900 passing yards. That was 14th most in the league. Am I out here trying to say that he is anything close to what he was in his prime where he was one of the best quarterbacks to ever play this position? No, he’s not. His mobility is shot. His arm talent is still very good, but he can’t get away with all of the throws he used to, and he’s never been a mechanically sound thrower. So, he does miss more throws than he used to where he used to be arguably the most accurate quarterback in the league, maybe outside of Tom Brady. But, as I mentioned, he still can make every throw that you could possibly ask of your starting quarterback. He still has good NFL arm strength because he’s coming down from having an elite NFL arm. And he does still have to me on film what has always been his superpower in his pocket presence. Does he have the high-end mobility to always capitalize on it with high-end play extension like he used to? No. But he can still sense the pressure, manage the pocket, step up, stop step left, step right, buy an angle for a tackle, buy time to extend plays where he is lethal, keeping his eyes downfield. And even in the second half of the season, we saw him get better and better at this where I think we saw him um trust his ankle much more and and be more mobile than he was certainly in the first six, seven weeks of the season where it was like eye opening where he was just standing in the pocket, you know, afraid to get hit basically. Like we saw a more confident, mobile version of Aaron Rodgers in the last six, seven weeks of the season where I think so many people just stopped watching the Jets entirely. So that makes sense why they didn’t see that version of Aaron Rogers and don’t think it’s there, but it was. And I’m almost talking myself into the idea that he’s going to play a lot better than he did last year. That this ranking on him, 76 overall rating, 21st overall quarterback, that he could actually play a good bit better than that. I do believe that he can. And maybe I just got burned by this so bad last year where I had the Jets fifth in my overall power rankings and um really bought in on that team being a Super Bowl contender. Uh maybe I’m just hedging against that a little bit um by not putting the up arrow on on Rogers and ranking him inside the top 20, but I would be lying if I said I, you know, don’t think he can play like a top 20 quarterback this upcoming season. And I I do think it’s possible, especially if he is buying back into an an Arthur Smith designing the offense for him, humbling himself a little bit in terms of not being the coach, GM, and quarterback of the team. Just come in and be the quarterback, play focused, play motivated on a, you know, in in an elite culture like the Pittsburgh Steelers, and it’s going to feel, I think, culture-wise, very much like home. Um, you know, I think Green Bay and Pittsburgh have always had parallels in terms of their legacy and kind of how they lean into the the historic notion of their football team and just being great cultures in general. It’s going to be much closer to that than what he had with the Jets. Um, so, you know, that’s where I’m at with the signing. I think Aaron Rogers can play like a top 24 quarterback in the league. I think he can distribute the offense, play a little bit better within play action and buy into that a little bit more and ultimately get this Steelers team to the playoffs, probably not win a Super Bowl, right? Like, he just doesn’t have those traits to go toe-to-toe with the big four elite quarterbacks all in the AFC. That’s just a lot to ask of this Steelers team and of Aaron Rogers. But like Rogers has discussed himself, can he come in, have a solid season, go out quote unquote on top on a playoff team where he he didn’t get all this negative energy, and just kind of let that be the last chapter in the Aaron Rogers book that I I like to think 10 years from now, we’ll remember. Probably the best um six-year run of quarterback play that we’ve ever seen. um you know, Patrick Mahomes contingent. I suppose I think that’s kind of the rosy outlook. Um is there a side where this goes south? Yeah, I I suppose. Um is he is there a chance he gets hurt at 41 years old as well? Like yeah, that’s it’s probably in there as well. So there is a floor to be considered with this signing as well. But at a as a one-year $10 million deal, I think this does all kind of make sense. And I think he can give them the best quarterback play they’ve had since Ben Rothllessberger. Is that not a reasonable and um effective way to kind of wrap up this Aaron Rogers conversation? I I think so at least. Um so if you guys think I’m still being too optimistic about Aaron Rogers, that’s fine. Let me know in the comments. Uh, it’s just my honest opinion on this signing and and kind of what they can expect from from Aaron Rogers. But beyond that, you got Mason Rudolph. I mean, in most situations, I would say, yeah, if you go to Mason Rudolph, who’s a career backup type, the season’s over. But in the case of the Pittsburgh Steelers, we’ve seen them still put together playoff caliber teams with Mason Rudolph and Mason Rudolph caliber quarterbacks. So technically speaking, can they continue to win games 20 to 17 and sneak things out um and and pull off their black magic as they’ve done? Technically speaking, yes. Um you know, he’s a he’s a career backup type, but he can run the offense as we know. And I expect him to be QB2 this year, not Will Howard. I know there’s a lot of hype around Will Howard. I like the idea of drafting Will Howard in the sixth round. He was a fascinating prospect where he’s he’s big, he’s a decent athlete, he’s got a strong arm, and he’s kind of an interesting dart throw because something really clicked for him. You know, the quarterback he was really for the entire regular season at Ohio State. Looked like, you know, a Joe Schmo transfer from was it can uh Kansas State, I think. Did not play well in the regular season for Ohio State. But when the lights got brightest and the playoffs rolled around, he looked like a real NFL passer. So, if something clicked for Will Howard and you give him a year to kind of sit and learn uh from an Aaron Rodgers in a good culture like this, is there a world where he shatters expectations as a sixth round pick? I think I think relative to where he got drafted, there is an an element of upside to that draft pick that he could be more than a Mason Rudolph, for example. But maybe he is kind of your long-term cheap Mason Rudolph replacement. So, a good draft pick for a sixth round. And is there a 5% chance he is your starter in 2026 as this team kind of sees what they have and maybe does do a little bit of a reset after going forward a little bit more with Aaron Rogers here, maybe. Um, not saying that’s for sure going to happen, but there’s a chance. So, again, 21st at quarterback. That’s where I’m at with it. Let’s go ahead and discuss who they have to throw to here. and if this group has enough to kind of do what I described and have Aaron Rogers play okay and sort of ride off into the sunset. Um, so we’ll start with the offseason changes with this group. And I ultimately said slightly upgraded with everything they did. They move on from George Pickkins and bring in DK Metaf. I like George Pickins a lot and I think you could even argue Pickins and Metaf are about the same caliber of wide receiver. But just like I talked about uh the loss of DK Metaf with Seattle, there is a bonus factor with getting a DK Metaf. And I think if this team’s going to live in so much 12 and 13 personnel, you still have to keep safeties honest and respect the verticality aspect of DK Metaf even in a way that George Pickins didn’t necessarily threaten. So, if that makes sense, like I think these guys are very similar caliber wide receivers, but you do get that bonus fear factor from DK Metaf, even if he comes with some inconsistencies in his game as well. And then on top of that, I do think the Steelers is kind of going to get DK and then trading away George Pickins. I think they also look at this as a bit of a quality of life addition. Yeah, DK Metaf can be a little frisky and get some penalties and you know, I’m not going to act like he is uh free of any sort of um what’s the right word here? Not character concerns, but noise, you know, where I’m going with this. DK Mechaf isn’t free of that. But I do think in terms of accountability and having to stay on top of him daytoday and just kind of being a headcase, I don’t think they’re as worried about that with DK Metaf. I think Metaf generally speaking is highly praised for his football character, whereas there are some questions with that with George Pickins. They’ve managed it well and I still think a lot of George Pickins, but yeah, I think they see that extra verticality aspect with with Metaf with the speed and not having to babysit him as much. It’s like if we’re going to pay one of these guys $33 million a year, we’d rather be DK Metaf if he’s out there and available. and they paid a second round pick to go make that swap, which isn’t nothing. But all of that together really accounts for me to say slightly upgraded at wide receiver because the rest of this for any other team would just be moving around depth pieces. Now Van Jefferson had to play here last year, 64% of the snaps and Robert Woods is going to come in and play a good bit for this Steelers team as well. Neither of those moved the needle for me in terms of additions or losses along with Mike Williams who came in and played 15% of their snaps last year. Um so again slightly upgraded this off seasonason I think at wide receiver and then tight end I think is much more straightforward. They did have Mike Cole Puit in that John Smith role in this Arthur Smith offense and then they’re able to go get John U Smith seemingly as a tackon to the trade that involved them sending Ma Fitzpatrick for Jaylen Ramsay. If you want my overall thoughts on that trade, I do actually really like that trade for the Steelers. They caught some flak for it, but I definitely see what they are going for here. Obviously, with what we’re going to discuss with Janu here and then even more so with Jaylen Ramsay when we get to the secondary there. But yeah, I do see this as an upgrade. Janu had a huge year last year. So, you pair that with some slight upgrades at wide receiver and I do think this team has more to work with with the weapons than they had last season. And that leaves them for me ranking with a B minus grade 22nd to 26th in the league. A league very deep with weapons. Seemingly most teams have a nice group of weapons to throw to. And in the case of the Steelers, DK Mechaf is doing a lot of heavy lifting towards that ranking. Um, I do really like DK Mechaf. I’ve, you know, kind of gone back and forth with him. Like I’ve heavily praised him at times. I thought he should have been a lock top 15 pick coming out in the draft. And I’ve obviously praised him a lot in Seattle and uh discussed how big of a loss I think it was for Seattle to lose the sort of X factor that he brings to the table as we described with how defenses have to respect his vertical ability. Like if if you don’t either play off coverage or shade a safety over the top, he is a 60 yard touchdown waiting to happen. And modern defenses hate that So, you have to play the Steelers now a certain way with DK Metaf in there. Like his size, speed, vertical threat ability, it speaks for itself. But at the same time, he’s had a lot of frustrations for a player that looks like this. You would assume we are talking about one of the better contested catch ball winners in the league to be something like what Mike Williams has been on his career or a T. Higgins, uh, Mike Evans, like these vertical X-wide receivers that win tough catches on the boundary. Your quarterback gets in a pinch on third down, just launch it out to DK Metaf, see if he can make a play. And Mechaf has actually very quietly, although I think this narrative around him has become more discussed since he’s been traded. Um, the last two years, DK Mechaf has seen more contested catch targets than any receiver in the league. uh at 72 contested catch targets over the last two years. Yet, he’s only converted 33% of those. So, that has led to a lot of inefficiency in the Seahawks offense. Now, in 2022, he did catch 51%. In his rookie season, he did catch 53% and 48% in 2020. So, like 3 years ago, he was doing that type of stuff, earned that respect, started to see all of those targets, and he hasn’t been able to convert these. And I don’t think he’s the best at kind of tracking the ball, adjusting his speed to run under the ball and find himself in the best position. He does not work back to the ball. And he doesn’t always kind of elevate and attack the football. You, you know, there’s smaller receivers. You think of like Tyreek Hill and like Stefon Diggs, smaller, more slender receivers. Those guys elevate and attack the football. They high point the football. Metaf is physically capable of doing that, but he doesn’t always do it. So maybe they can coach him up a little bit better and get him to do that better, but um he has had his deficiencies that have held him back from being sort of a top 10 true number one wide receiver. Now, does he have the skill set to quote unquote be your best wide receiver if you build the rest of your room appropriately around him? Yes, absolutely. We’ve even seen that at times in Seattle and certainly here in Pittsburgh. He is going to be in every bit their number one wide receiver. He might be in the top three in targets uh this season. I don’t know if the Steelers are quite going to pass enough uh to be that, but I do think he’ll be in the top three in terms of percentage of targets in the passing game. And if you want to talk a little fantasy football for a second, I’m big on what DK Metaf is going to do this year. And maybe that’s in large part because I do think Aaron Rogers can still throw the football and push the ball downfield and utilize a DK Metaf. Um, but yeah, I I love drafting DK Metaf and especially if you’re playing like best baseball drafts on underd under underdog or if you want to do his seasonl long number, which right now is under a,000 yards, that is a that is a pick I really like on underdog. If you’ve got a couple other seasonl long ones you want to pair with that, DK to get 950 yards feels very obtainable to me. Um, so I I will remind you guys if you want to play best or seasonl long pick them on underdog, sign up using code TFG. They’ll give you a bonus match up to $1,000 and you’ll support my channel in the process. But yeah, Metaf is definitely someone I’m targeting uh in in fantasy football. And there is one other thing before we talk about the rest of this group, uh, which isn’t going to be the longest of conversations with the rest of these guys, but like I I obviously think for how they’re going to use DK Mechaf and a lot of the throws Aaron Rogers can still make, he’s going to he’s going to have a success. And I like that, for example, that 949 yard mark for him. I think he can get more than that one way or another. But there is room potentially for him to take that leap to being more of a true alpha like number one type of wide receiver. And I think it comes with sort of the chemistry with an Aaron Rodgers. Now, it gets a little murky because Rogers is probably only going to play one year here, but there have been some frustrations with Metaf in terms of some of those timing routes, whether it’s comebackers or getting to the right place at the right time on a dig route where Gino would trust that Metaf would be there. and Mechaf would just end up either slowing his route or not getting there in time for one reason or another and those balls would end up in the hands of safeties cuz he’s just throwing it into space where it then goes to the second the third level and safeties would pick it off. So, if Metaf can really lock in and get on the same page with Rogers with specifically back shoulder comebacks and all of the different hand signal stuff that Aaron Rogers is always going to do with his receivers, if he can become that that mindmeld wide receiver like Rogers has had with Devonte Adams in the past, that could be an area of Metaf’s game that is a next step that he hasn’t always had um those the the proper timing and chemistry with the quarterbacks he’s had in Seattle. I don’t think it’s always been the quarterback’s fault, though. So, I I think that could be an area that leads to some frustrations as well within this offense, though. There is upside for him to work at that stuff, too. Um so, that’s just something I’m very interested to see with with him in this passing game. But, yeah, the rest of this group, I mean, the rest of the weapons we can really go through pretty quick. They bring in Robert Woods to be a blocker here, basically. Uh he’s not going to be efficient. I don’t even think he’s going to get that many targets, but he has been in these Shanahan style offenses and he is a tough dude. They signed him for a reason. Um and he is, I think, in many ways going to frustratingly take a lot of snaps away from more explosive options like Calvin Austin and Roman Wilson. But he is going to play here and he’s going to be a veteran wide receiver that Rogers can trust. he’s always kind of had one or two of these guys um that’s going to be in the right place at the right time and I I think he’s going to have his usefulness for what he is, but he’s a 33-year-old wide receiver that hasn’t been really efficient for years now. Then you have Calvin Austin who I think will be kind of a one-on-one split with Robert Woods. Austin’s going to be much more of the explosive option other than DK Metave. And certainly when they get into 11 personnel on true passing downs, he can run some of those go balls and digs and deep crosses. And I do think Calvin Austin is going to have some big games. But if the Steelers are able to live in the game script that they want to, which is going to be heavy personnel, um, and frankly more of a simplified third down passing game with Aaron Rogers for the most part just working with DK Metaf. I just I think there’s going to be games where Austin just goes catchless honestly kind of as we’ve seen. I think he’s talented. I do. He’s an undersized wide receiver, but he can get open deep. I like his route running. Um there’s a world for him to carve out more of a role as a true slot wide receiver on third downs. that would probably be his best path to being a kind of breakout player and a and a productive option for this team is to fully beat out Roman Wilson as the sort of Randle Cobb for Aaron Rodgers, the guy that can get open on a third and five and present himself to the quarterback and scramble drill. But it is Roman Wilson in year two here that I think makes that complicated. Like I think these two guys eat into each other’s reps from the slot along with Robert Woods. It’s just going to be a big rotation with these guys. Um, and I think Roman Wilson, who’s ironically my pro comp on him, was Randall Cobb. There is a chance for him to work here and be much better in year two than he was in year one. You know, as a third round pick, he didn’t even get on the field. He was a healthy scratch at times. It was one of the biggest eyeopening questions of a guy that seemed to have a high floor coming out of Michigan. maybe not the highest ceiling and that’s kind of why he went in the third round, but the fact that he really wasn’t able to get on the field for a group of weapons that didn’t have a lot of options. It was interesting to say the least. So, he’s got to kind of figure things out and get on the field. Um, but he is a guy that’s really good on crossing routes and you know, ideally he would actually be the guy that could overtake Robert Woods as your wide receiver too in this setup. Like I think Wilson coming out of Michigan fits in Arthur Smith offense pretty well based on what he did well in college running those crossing routes which is a staple of this passing game. Um and someone that I think is a willing blocker for a slot wide receiver. So maybe Robert Woods can be a good mentor for him and he can learn some stuff and kind of be some bit of a hybrid of a Randle Cobb Robert Woodsy type of player. You know both guys have been in their prime capable sort of number two wide receivers. I think Roman Wilson can get into that mix. It’s just year one was really concerning. Um, and then you get it into, okay, Ben Scorronic, they bring in Robert Woods because I think Ben Scorronic was so useless as a wide receiver for them that they wanted someone that has at least a little bit more receiving chops. Um, but he still probably makes the team as a specialteamer and a blocking specialist. Scotty Miller, you know, deep threat. Brandon Johnson has played a little bit. They might only keep five wide receivers here. that wouldn’t be a huge surprise. Um, and then you get into the tight ends, which kind of brings us back to the starting player conversation. They really have two full-time starters, I think, in Pat Frymouth and Janu Smith. And then with what we said about how much 13 personnel this team is going to run, Darnell Washington himself, uh, is going to be in many ways a rotational starter. And I don’t know, I don’t have too much to add on Pat Frymouth at this point. I feel like we have a pretty firm understanding of who he is. He I think has in many ways become the new kind of poster boy for your good possession Y tight end. I think he’s you know kind of been the next generation’s Hunter Henry like five years apart so it’s not a full generation but um yeah he’s a good balanced player kind of a jack of all trades master of none at the tight end position. I I don’t think he’s a great blocker but he’s a solid blocker. Uh not the most dynamic athlete or separator but he’s good enough in that regard. He’s got good hands. He’s had, you know, he had some drops last year for sure. He had five drops. It’s not where he’s been at on his career. I think he can clean that up. He did catch uh 86% of his contested catch looks last year. That was crazy. But he’s been a 55% guy in his career, so that’s that’s very good for a possession tight end. Not necessarily great. Um, obviously, if he can do what he did last year, that is great. But he’s going to be a useful player here. He gives them the balance in this tight end room. He’s not the blocker Darnell Washington is, but he’s a better receiver. He’s not the receiver John Smith is, but he’s a better blocker. So, he gives them total flexibility. If they want to run 13 personnel, he can be the middleman there, where Darnell is more of the inline option. And if you want to be 12 personnel, you could either go with Darnell and Pat Frierouth and have Pat Frier do more of the wing stuff or you can put Pat um in line. He has enough size to block defensive ends even if he’s not as good at it. And you can put Janu Smith as the wing player where he’s more dynamic. So he is kind of the the pivot piece, the lynch pin if you will for everything they want to do schematically speaking. And then you have John Smith who comes in. And fun fact, I’m in a tight end boosted fantasy league where tight ends get one and a half points per reception. I had both Pat Frymouth and John Smith. Needless to say, somebody’s not so happy about this trade for the Steelers because it’s going to eat into both of these guys workloads. If Jonnu wasn’t brought in here, I actually think Pat Frymouth was gonna set up for a really nice year this year as the clear-cut number two target in this passing game. And John in Miami did some really good stuff. He’s coming off a career year in Miami. So Pittsburgh’s getting a very good version of John Smith. But yeah, these two guys are going to totally eat into each other in terms of targets. I think they both go from guys that were going to be top 12 fantasy football tight ends to now they’re probably top 20 and guys that I just I’m not that fascinated in anymore um because that they’re going to be weak toe and inconsistent. Um but for the Pittsburgh Steelers from a football perspective, yeah, this is going to work for for all of the schematic reasons we detailed. And Janu, like I said, coming off a career year, he can pull away from linebackers. He’s he’s still one of the more dynamic tight ends after the catch. So, if you’re just flipping the ball to him on a play action boot in the flat, he can consistently make slot corners miss and fight for tough yardage. And, you know, if you’re running that play on a second and six, you throw it to him at the at the line of scrimmage, you’ve got a first down. Like, he can do a lot of good stuff. He won a lot of tough catches last year. uh he is very much gonna be in tandem with Pat Frimouth their number two receiver. Who’s going to be 2A? Who’s going to be 2B? It’s going to be week to week. But definitely had to put those two guys both up there with the starters because they are going to be in my opinion number two and number three in receiving yards for this team. I would bet Jonnu gets more yards and Pat Frymouth gets more receptions would be how I would envision this going. But when the Steelers are able to live in the game script that they want paired with a DK Metaf, this is a good enough group. If teams are taking away the run game and they have to get into more of a drop back pass situation, that’s where the Steelers are going to run into a little bit more trouble, obviously. Um, let’s talk about Darnell Washington while we’re going down this path, though. So, you know, there was a lot of hype for Darnell Washington. I I think he was like number 30 on the consensus board. Um, in in that in that year, I was a little bit lower on him, but I did love Darnell Washington as kind of a day two draft pick. They ended up getting him on day three. Fell for I think some injury concerns. Those fortunately haven’t surfaced in the league. Um, but he’s coming he’s really coming along as a blocker. He he very much is an extension of your offensive line. Frankly, at 280 pounds, I mean, you can make a case that Darnell Washington maybe should have just gone all the way and converted to an offensive lineman because he would be a special athlete uh for an offensive lineman, but for a tight end, even though he ran a good 40 time at his size, like I think he ran a 464, um he’s very stiff. He struggles to accelerate. It hurts his route running and he’s just not an overly practical full-time starting tight end. But 413 personnel as an extension of your offensive line, he is still someone that once he can build up speed off of play action or, you know, get on crossing routes or dump it off into the flat, like he is still a really tough body to get down after the catch. And he still has enough buildup speed on a straight line route to be a problem. So, he’s going to be a part of the rotation and um you know, it’s going to be fun to watch these three guys in tandem together. Um and then you got Connor Hayward who would play fullback if they ever wanted a fullback. He hasn’t been entirely useless. Um but kind of a one-dimensional tweener of a Hback type that I still think makes this team for certain packages. Um then you got your receiving backs. I do think I fully expect Jaylen Warren will be their third down back. He’s just been pretty productive in the receiving game. He’s got good hands. He’s got good transitions after the catch. He’s good enough as a receiving back. Doesn’t really move the needle, but doesn’t hurt them in that regard either. You also have Kenneth Gainwell. In theory, they could do some fun stuff with him. He still has some juice in the receiving game. Uh Cordel Patterson’s around here for now. We’ll see if he actually makes this team. He’s 34 years old. Um but obviously a converted wide receiver. Those would be your core targets out of the back field. I don’t think Caleb Johnson in his rookie season is going to get too much work in the receiving game. I don’t. Um, but that rounds out your group of weapons. Again, they rank 22nd to 26 with a B minus grade. And I think within the confines of the system they want to run, they’re going to be efficient. And I think they have everything they need for that sort of heavy personnel playactionoriented passing game. But yeah, once they get into dropback situations, I I think it’s really going to be mostly like Aaron Rogers working with DK Metaf and they’re going to have some success there. Um, but the level of chemistry that those guys are able to establish is going to be paramount for the upside of this passing game. But let’s now discuss the backfield. And they made some changes here. Naji is out the door. Um, successful Steelers career. He now heads to the Chargers. Um, but they replace him with Caleb Johnson in the third round out of Iowa. A lot of expectations for that draft pick. And then as we mentioned um they they brought in Kenneth Gainwell as well. I ended up saying slightly downgraded with this group. I like Naji Harris. I think if Caleb Johnson can become as good as Naji Harris that’s a huge success. I think it’s possible. Um but to expect that from him in his in his rookie season is a little bit harder. So slightly downgraded though. I do like the addition of Caleb Johnson here and I think there are um reasonable hopes that this can go quite well. Now, of course, with him coming in as a rookie and he’s not an Ashton Ginty caliber prospect, hence why he went in the third round and not in the top six like Ginty did, you know, we rank this the Raiders inside the top 10 of our running back rankings. The Steelers, I think, much more so have to prove that out. Um, but they do rank 20th to 22nd with a backfield that yes has Jaylen Warren, but I think the expectation is that Caleb Johnson is going to be the lead back, especially for early down work. And from a scheme fit perspective, this pick made so much so much sense. Johnson was at his best running wide zone at Iowa. So much so that I was actually critical at, you know, to a degree on Caleb Johnson where if he went to a team that wanted to run more inside zone or was more of a shotgun oriented run game, um, or asked more of a stop start style running style from their running back, I had some questions about Caleb Johnson. I thought he had poor acceleration, that his agility was below average. Um, but on wide zone runs where he has real home run hitting buildup speed, his running style is actually very similar to Derrick Henry, which obviously Arthur Smith had in Tennessee. He is not Derrick Henry. He’s not 250 pounds. Nobody is Derrick Henry, but it’s the same idea. In fact, my pro comp on him was Tevin Coleman, who ran a lot of that wide zone buildup speed style run game uh with the Falcons under Kyle Shanahan back in the day. Um that’s who I see in Caleb Johnson. And I think within the confines of this offense, he every bit will be the lead back. Um he’s going to be very comfortable with those style runs. That’s essentially what Iowa did. Um, in fact, Iowa’s system was very similar to Arthur Smith’s system. Um, so he’ll be very familiar there. But yeah, he’s gonna have some big runs. Uh, like especially baseball drafts, underdog fantasy. Uh, Caleb’s going to have some huge weeks when things work when he can get into the second level. He is going to be he has that speed train ability where he’ll put a stiff arm on you, he’ll run through an arm tackle, undersized DBs, just have a hard time getting this guy down on the ground. Um, so when they can get him into the second level, he’s going to be able to make some noise. Might there be some weeks where good run defenses take away those holes, force the Steelers into other running concepts and into the passing game where I think we will see Caleb come off the field more for third down work. Yeah, Caleb might have some quieter weeks as well, at least within his rookie season. Um, but I am generally speaking optimistic about Caleb Johnson. Dynasty Leagues, I have been targeting a lot of Caleb Johnson. Um, but I think yeah, best baseball formats as well. Maybe crank him up a round or two as well. Um, but the nice thing about the Steelers is their floor is quite nice. If for some reason Caleb Johnson just doesn’t see it or his acceleration is an issue, they can just go to Jaylen Warren for the most part. Now, I don’t think Warren is the type of guy that can stay durable for a 250 300 carry season. Um, and I think Warren can run wide zone, but he’s probably better uh north and south with with his shiftiness on inside zone. Um, you know, he has speed, but it’s it’s it’s not quite to the degree of like Caleb Johnson’s breakaway ability, which is ultimately something you want to look for in your lead back in a wide zone heavy offense. um because the whole idea is to turn that corner, get you into space where you can provide those explosive runs in the run game. But yeah, he’s a very good balance back. They’re happy to have him. He’s very good as a third down option. I think that makes him a brilliant compliment to Caleb Johnson. He’s got the smooth hands, makes guys miss out in space. He’s got more shiftiness than someone like Caleb Johnson has. He’s had over 300 yards in each of the last two years. You wish he was a better pass blocker. Maybe with Naji gone, uh Jaylen uh Warren can realize like if he can just become a good pass blocker, he can be a really valued asset for this team because I don’t think carving out a you know RB1 job is really in his future for the Steelers team and probably not elsewhere either. But long term like could this be a really logical onetwo punch within this system? Yeah, I I do think so. But Caleb Johnson does have to come out and prove it, which is why the Steelers do rank 20th to 22nd. But there is a lot of upside for this to be more of a top half group of the league if Caleb is just one of those third round rookies that, pun intended, hits the ground running and is closer to a star back out the gate, which um you know, I think he has potential to kind of replace Naji’s shoes within his rookie season. It just we need to see it, right? um behind these guys, you know, Kenneth Gainwell, honestly, considering how good the blocking’s been in Philadelphia, he’s just been way too inconsistent. But as an RB3, sure, again, Cordell, I don’t know that he’ll make the team. We’ll see what kind of shape he’s in, honestly. He’s going to have to earn this roster spot. But they did bring in Trey Surman, who would give you a little bit more of of a size profile. I’m not a big Trey Surman fan. Evan Hull. Yeah, it’s it’s there’s not a whole lot to say, frankly, after Caleb and Jaylen Warren, which is fine. And then I didn’t mention this earlier, but the Steelers are one of three teams who will not be getting any sort of multiplier from the quarterback in the run game. Just no mobility aspect from Rogers. Even like some quarterbacks in this series will get the get an ever so slight contribution to the run game because they’re at least threats off of like play action boots. Rogers, his mobility is so shot at this point that a lot of defensive ends will be able to collapse down on the wide zone run game off of those naked play action boot fakes. And uh a lot of really athletic defensive ends can crash down, take away those cutback lanes from for guys like Caleb Johnson. And if the quarterback does keep it, they’ll be able to catch up with them pretty quickly. So you don’t get that boost that other teams do get, which isn’t the end of the world. It’s just other teams are getting a numbers advantage that the Steelers do not. But overall, a promising young backfield with the rookie Caleb Johnson that I’m very excited to see. Um, let’s talk about the offensive line. So, not very many changes this off season. They let Dan Moore walk. He gets an absolute bag in free agency by the Titans. that was more uh you know him getting $20 million a year was more of a reflection of the Titans desperation than it was him being some major loss for the Steelers. They were lucky to have Dan Moore last year because Troy Fatanu, their first round pick, played week one and then missed the rest of the season. Um they’re hoping to get Troy Fatanu back, their four first round pick from last year. And then likewise, James Daniels also got a decent contract with Miami, but he only played four games and then left. So compared to last year’s season, they’re not losing too much at guard and from James Daniels. So I ultimately went with slightly upgraded slash to be determined. You know, Dan Moore, he’s he’s fine. I I think there are very reasonable expectations that Troy Fatanu can at least be fine. Um, but there’s very real reasons to believe he can be an upgrade at tackle from Dan Moore. So, again, I said slightly upgraded to to be determined on the offensive line. Um, but let’s go through this group and it’s one of the more fascinating offensive lines in the league where this is a very young, talented, but unproven offensive line. So, for the rankings, that’s reflected. They show up 24th for the overall offensive line. Um, but for pass blocking, near the bottom of the league, frankly, 27th to 28th. They have a lot of questions that need to be answered on how well this group can hold up for Aaron Rogers. Um, but from a run blocking perspective, a little bit better. They rank 19th there. Uh, where they do actually get a little bit of a boost from their skill blockers with guys like Robert Woods and Darnell Washington that we talked about. Um, but this group gets the wildcard icon for me. This is a group that is going to in many ways determine the success of this Steelers team. There is a lot of talent here. Four young players all drafted within the last couple of years. Um, four players that get the up arrow for me for a Steelers uh team that has done a very good job coaching up offensive lineman. um that I think for a long time has just needed the right combination of upside and youth on the offensive line to get them back to their kind of glory days where back in the Killer B days that was one of the better offensive lines in the league. They’ve had a fall from grace there for years. Um and they still have to prove that they can get there, but man, this could be as much as a top 10 offensive line this year if everything can come together. I think they really do have that upside. It’s just they are that unproven where they come in more towards the bottom 10 in the league as far as how we rank these guys heading into the season. So, let’s go from left to right. Um, you got Brick Jones who has started at right tackle and been very up and down. A first round pick in 2023 that um wasn’t able to fully supplant himself as a starter in that rookie season. last year he did and I would say struggled early and settled in much more consistently in the second half of the year from a pass blocking standpoint and then from a run blocking regard you see a lot of those athletic flashes that was less of a question from him at Georgia but even there he has yet to fully put the entire package together in terms of being able to play fast and consistently get to the right man um so just a lot of talent really athletic guy he’s got all the traits there. Year year two was better than year 1, but you would certainly want to see a bigger leap from year two to year three. And he’s also going to be making a transition to what is supposedly, according to the Steelers, his more natural position at left tackle. So maybe that can help. Um maybe he is one of these guys that’s just much more comfortable on the left side. So maybe there’s some extra optimism with that switch. Uh but yeah, it’s a big year three for Brick Jones. I would say if he doesn’t take a notable step forward, we might be talking about them um declining his fifth year option potentially and like maybe putting a lot of pressure on replacing him. I don’t think he was such a disaster last year that you’re in panic mode either, but he’s got a pretty wide wide spectrum here and only time will tell how this goes. Um, but if he is as good as he was last year, yeah, he’s going to take his losses and he’s going to miss some blocks in the run game and he’s more of just a adequate piece on your offensive line with some athleticism. But then at left guard with Isaac Samalu, um, so I mentioned this offensive line gets the wild card icon for me. It’s a polarizing group. Could go one way or another. Four pieces here are because they’re young and unproven. On the flip side, Isaac Seamalu at his age turns 32 years old this year and um did take a dip in pass blocking efficiency last year. Um whether or not he continues to regress or if it was more of a random outlier season as opposed to real regression. That’s another factor here. Ultimately, I think the most likely situation here is that yeah, he’s 32 years old. He can’t quite move as well as he once did. He’s going to lose a little bit more than he once did, but he’s still, as he was last year, a solid pass blocker and a good run blocker, a just really strong guy. Um, has played over 6,000 snaps in his career. He knows where he’s going. He knows who to pick up um against stunts and blitzes. Someone that’s like just a very solid offensive lineman. And if guys around him develop and say Amalu can settle in as your third or fourth best offensive lineman, whereas right now he projects is probably your second, you’re in a really good spot. If he has to be your second best offensive lineman, kind of like he was last year, it’s not going to be necessarily ideal. Um, Zack Frasier, I would say, was their best offensive lineman last year. He was a slam dunk pick as a rookie, second round pick. I was just dead wrong. I just missed on Zack Frasier. I I I don’t have a great reason for it. I overthought some of his losses against the bull rush at West Virginia and I didn’t think he was all that athletic. I thought he was going to be a solid center. Not that I thought he was bad or anything. I thought he would be a starter in the league, but his tape in Pittsburgh last year was really fun to watch. I just mise him. I’ll I’ll hold my hand up. Um, not that again, not that I hated him and it was a disaster, but he just has been better than I thought he would be. Um, really good core strength. I mean, that comes from the wrestling background, but when he gets his hands inside on you, he’s just such a natural blocker. Really good instincts, climbing to the second level, finding guys. Um, and and he blocked wide zone much better than I expected, too. I I think um even if he wasn’t the best athlete, uh, the core strength does show there. When you block wide zone, you’re going to find yourself in a lot of awkward angles at times. And he’s just really good at getting in the mud and fighting and scratching and clawing from odd odd body positioning just to have effective blocks. So yeah, he’s a really good player. We’ll see what the kind of year two looks like for him. I think he as well, just like we talked about with Jackson Powers Johnson in our last deep dive with the Raiders, like he could get into that kind of who’s the next best center not named Creed Humphrey debate. He’s not there yet. He’s got to prove it here in year two. I think from a pass blocking perspective, there’s still room to get better. Um, but he was he was still pretty solid there. So, he is their best piece and you’re fully optimistic that you have in all likelihood a top five, you know, worst case top 10 center already here in Zack Frasier. So, he’s a stud. And then at right guard, Mason McCormack, he’s him and Brick Jones are probably your two big question marks. Um, you know, I feel much more optimistic about Frasier and Fatanu just because I loved Fatanu as a prospect. Um, and he just missed his rookie season. But yeah, McCormack, a fourth round pick coming in, was just streaky, but he is nasty. He’s got that mentality you look for. He’s got a good first step and, you know, a pretty solid athlete for such a big guy. Uh, so for him, it’s just it’s just continuing to clean up his technique. Um, continuing to get used to that uh switch from uh playing at South Dakota State, you know, going against NFL competition. It was the, you know, to expect him to come in and be a rock solid guard in his rookie season was going to be really a tough ask, but he did start damn near every game and certainly held his own. It’s just going to be a matter of establishing that consistency and cleaning things up. So, he has absolutely starting guard potential and that could hit as early as this season here in year two. And then, yeah, Troy Fatanu at right tackle. I’m a huge fan of Troy Fatanu. He just had so much athleticism and technique and toughness. It was just really hard to imagine him failing at the next level. Now that he’s sliding to right tackle, it’s hard not to see Zack Tom in this player where he doesn’t have the longest. Uh although he did actually measure out with longer arms than people expected, but he does have kind of a smaller frame like Zack Tom. Maybe never going to be the most powerful player or an elite tackle. Although Zack Tom is pushing that territory and I think Troy Fatanu just might have that sort of projection in him. There’s a lot of Rashan Slater in his game as well. So like I was a huge fan of him when they took him. Was surprised he fell to them. It’s a bummer that he got hurt. So obviously he’s got to stay healthy and prove what he’s got at the NFL level. But I’m not really worried about it. We just have to see it. And that rounds out a really fun starting five. Uh, honestly, I’m I’m excited to see how these guys can grow together and and climb in these rankings together. As far as the depth goes, it’s NFL depth. They’ve got a couple guys that have been around here. You know, Calvin Anderson was here last year. He’s a he’s a decent enough swing tackle. I’m not going to complain about him as a backup tackle. I think that’s just fine. Then you got some undrafted types behind that. We’ll see who sticks around with that group. Um, on the interior of the offensive line, Spencer Anderson was a seventh round pick out of Maryland. I think he played a little bit last year and and was okay. You know, I think they found a backup guard in the seventh round as the Steelers are pretty pretty good at finding. Um, so you got a backup guard, you got a backup tackle, and then Ryan McCollum would probably be your backup center as he was last year. Uh, more of a concern there. You hope Zack Frasier can stay healthy. Maybe Spencer Anderson can figure out um how to play center or maybe say Amalu or McCormack could do it. Um, maybe get some flexibility there. Um, but yeah, Max Sharping, Nick Broker, not not a whole lot to speak on there to be honest. So, like you got a backup tackle, you got one backup interior player there in Spencer Anderson. If you suffer more than one injury, you would run into more trouble, which is normal for I think just about every offensive line in the league. But that does conclude our offensive breakdown for the Pittsburgh Steelers. And as we head into this upcoming season, the Steelers do have a lot to prove on this side of the ball. I have them as our 25th ranked offense as we’re ranking these teams, you know, near their floor as we head into the season. Um, 26th in passing game, 20th in run game. You know, you look especially at the offensive line and the young running back and Caleb Johnson coming in. A lot to prove. I do think this team, if those two areas specifically can go right, um you know, this can be more of a 15th, 16th ranked offense, which, you know, not not to spoil the whole defensive breakdown here, but we know this Steelers team can play some defense. that’s going to be your formula for this this team to be um you know the best version of themselves, which I’m not going to sit here and sell Super Bowl upside on this Steelers team with this this offense, but you know, can they actually get into the playoffs and maybe win a playoff game this year, maybe two if they get lucky? like, yeah, best case scenario if this can be like a top 10 offensive line and Caleb Johnson is a superstar and Rogers can be, you know, not his old self, but maybe even a little bit better than I have him ranking. You know, we ranked them 21st at QB. Can Rogers be the 16th best quarterback? Yeah, like that could that could maybe lead to a feel-good version of this Steelers team, but that is all definitely going to be contingent on this Steelers defense reaching their upside as well. So, let’s now transition to the Steelers defense. And we’ll begin here by taking a look at their offseason changes along the defensive line here. And the Steelers doing what they like to do, keeping the pipeline going for this D line, but in a big way this time around as they spend their first round pick on Derek Harmon out of uh Oregon. So a big addition there. They do lose Larry Oen Joby uh who played about half of their snaps last year and continue to be a nice part of that rotation. So those are the kind of core changes here. Um but some other moves too. They do lose Montravius Adams, who again has been a minor part of that rotation, was better in 2023 than he was last season. So, they’re going to let him go. They spent a fifth round pick on the very large Yaya Black out of Iowa. The Steelers do love themselves some Iowa Hawkeyes where they hardly have to change their jersey colors. I think they added three or four Hawkeyes to this year’s team. And then Daniel Aqual as well, who ate up a bunch of snaps in New England last year, is going to be competing for a roster spot, but not a bad little um piece to put into the mix here. So, I said hopefully upgraded on the interior of the defensive line. I think there are very real reasons to believe that Derrick Harmon can give them more than what they got from Larry Ogen. Joby specifically being the core change there. And then on the edge, I just said neutral. You know, they bring in Preston Smith mid-season. He played kind of a rotational role for them. Ended up only playing 14% of their final snaps. And they do bring in Jack Sawyer in the fourth round. Um, getting younger with that kind of rotational edge spot. I certainly was lower on Sawyer. I don’t really see him as a long-term starter for this team, but can he be a younger, cheaper version of what they had in Preston Smith for the second half of the season? Yes, absolutely. You could argue slightly upgraded, but I’m not high enough on Sawyer to go that far. I think it was a nice enough draft pick that leaves the change at edge as neutral. But let’s dive into this defensive line. And as I say all the time, I’m ranking these units and these teams at or near their floor. And for the Pittsburgh Steelers, this defensive line is such a core part of what they are all about. And ranking the Steelers defensive line at or near their floor. They still rank inside the top four for my final pass rush rankings. Second to fourth for overall pass rush. A little bit lower for Dline run defense, but still inside the top 10, sixth to 10th there. And overall, the Steelers defensive line comes in as my third overall defensive line. But what’s crazy is, like I said, that is closer to their floor. If your floor is the third best defensive line in the league, that’s insane. There are aspects of this Dline that can absolutely have the arrow pointing up and leave this as the best defensive line in the NFL this season if a few things go right and really set this defense over the edge to get them beyond kind of the point where they’ve been over the last few years where this has been a good D line and this defense has been kind of fifth to 10th on a year-to-year basis. This is the most talented collection um of players that they’ve had on this defensive line. I think is the deepest collection of talent that they’ve had in a long, long time, if maybe ever. And yeah, like I said, if a few things go right here, this could be a gamechanging defensive line that maybe does see this um Steelers defense reach new heights that could inevitably lead to them maybe being more of a legitimate championship contender overall. Um, so I do think we have to start with TJ Watt, who frankly is one of those sort of wildcard pivot points for that discussion we just had. We know TJ Watt’s a really freaking good player, but he is coming off a down year last year and a year where he wasn’t good old TJ Watt, that transformative elite pass rushing presence. He is now on the other side of 30 years old. It is very much possible that what we saw last year was age regression for a a player that has always won at the core of what he does with his bend and get off an athletic twitch on top of yes some power and excellent technique. But it is possible that we saw some physical regression and the Steelers are betting against that. The Steelers came out uh in good timing here. It’s kind of funny. The opposite ends of the Jaylen Ramsay trade have been uh have worked out for me timing wise because they traded Jaylen Ramsay the day after I dropped the Dolphins deep dive. That sucked. Well, the Steelers went ahead and made that trade before their deep dive here and granted me the TJ Watt extension to talk about here in this deep dive. Um, but obviously the Steelers making TJ Watt the highest paid non-quarterback in the NFL for the next three seasons is a big deal and they are betting against regression on TJ Watt because I do think we did see a lesser version of TJ Watt last year, a version that would not be worth $41 million. Still a really nice player and someone that would be worth, you know, 20 $25 million. like still a probably a high-end two if if you want to really look at his production in the most down year he’s had in a long long time if we’re being realistic about that. Now obviously I’m not saying that is just who he is now and the Steelers like I said are not saying that’s who he is now but Steelers fans will come out and say well yeah obviously he didn’t play as well. He got hurt around week 14 and that’s where at the end of the season he frankly disappeared. you couldn’t find TJ Watt with a pair of binoculars um in terms of making impacts in games for the final month of the season. And that’s fair, but Steelers fans, I I will give you this. Um TJ Watt wasn’t his good old self well before that, weeks 1 through 14 before that ankle injury that everybody wants to point to. He was 46th in the NFL in pass rush win rate. He was 24th in the NFL in pressures. I had already had conversations on my podcast, which I do have a podcast, the Fully Inflated Football Podcast if you want to check it out, but I had already had conversations before the ankle injury about he had been quiet and was starting to feel his age a little bit more. And those numbers do back it up. So, yeah, he is kind of the ultimate wild card for this defense and this team this year after they just gave him that massive contract. I mean, if he is what he was last year, that’s a massive overpay. They’re basically paying an extra quarterback here. Now, yeah, they can get away with it a little bit more because Rogers is playing for basically nothing. They’re going to have presumably a rookie quarterback contract after this. they can kind of um sell it to themselves a little bit better, but that’s still, you know, you still want to properly utilize your resources and that could be two or three other players that you could pay um with the surplus money that TJ Watt is potentially going to be overpaid here. Or what we saw last year was just a down year. Turns out he is a freak athlete and he’s poised for another two or three run of being an elite differencemaking defensive player of the year candidate. And frankly, I questioned the Steelers last year when they extended Cam Hayward at 35 years old after multiple years of regression. And they look like geniuses for the contract they gave Cam Hayward. So, the Steelers have earned a little bit of benefit of the doubt here. And I don’t want to keep this all negative. Um, but there there there are very real signs that point to regression from TJ Watt. So, a tough player to rank as we head into his age 31 season, coming off the the least productive year he’s had in a long, long time for the sake of the series. He gets a 90 overall rating. Still in that superstar category for me, but not quite in that elite top tier of edge rushers, at least for how we’re ranking him right now. again closer to the floor and the idea that he isn’t quite what he used to be, but I do put that up and down yellow arrow on him as well where yeah, there is a world where he gets back to being one of the two or three best defensive players in the entire NFL and that would go a long way towards everything we said about maybe this defensive line helping this defense take that real step into being an elite championship caliber defense. The last thing I’ll say on TJ Watt is despite some of the drop off in the pass rush production last year, he is still every bit an elite rundefending edge, I think short of Max Crosby, um I would say TJ Watt is the second best rundefending edge and even then you’re splitting hairs. I think TJ Watt has um even more kind of playmaking gut feel about him, whereas Max Crosby in terms of his ability to truly set a hard edge and dictate the line of scrimmage with a little bit more size uh would probably get a little bit more nod in the traditional sense of defending the run, but he is absolutely going to contribute to the run defense as well. But surely Steelers fans will have a rational and um kind response to my take there on TJ Watt. But one way or another you do expect that TJ Watt is going to be an impact player off the edge for this team. That much is fair. It’s just whether he’s going to be like a 55 pressure 10 or so sack player as kind of a really high-end number two caliber rusher as he was last year or if he can get back to being damn near double that which he was in his prime 80 pressure up to 20 sack seasons. We’ll see. Obviously be great for the Steelers um and their fans if he could get back to that level. U but the beauty here is they don’t need him necessarily to become his elite old self. this can still become the best defensive line in the league if TJ watches is what he was last year. They have other avenues for that to happen mostly with their interior defensive lineman. But I do want to actually talk about Alex Heismith next and kind of keep things with the edge and then we’ll work our way inside. Look, Alex Heismith, I think you can make a damn strong argument that on a efficiency basis was the better edge rusher in Pittsburgh last year. It’s just he did miss some time so the final numbers didn’t look quite that way. But I mean again from an efficiency standpoint, Alex Highmith had 54 pressures on 323 pass rush snaps. That’s I mean I’m not going to go ahead and calculate that, but it’s what 16 17% pressure rate, right? That’s insane. TJ Watt was actually below that 10% threshold. Uh in terms of pressure rate, he had 57 pressures. So just three more than Heismith had on damn near double the amount of pass rush snaps. 599 to Highmith’s 323. So Heismith was a true game changer last year. It’s just a bummer that he missed um the the uh five games that he did. And honestly, you could argue that the up arrow should even be on him as well. I’m not going to sit here and argue against the idea that Highmith might even have another step in him. In fact, if he just played at the level he did in 12 games last year for 17 games, maybe I would put him into that kind of true number one superstar edge rush tier. I have him just sniffing that in this series. The 85 rating is the stud tier. The 86 rating is a superstar rating for these edge rushers. So, he’s just sniffing it. Maybe he can get there. I didn’t necessarily put the up arrow on him. Um, but you could argue for it. Either way, Alex Icemith has absolutely learned from TJ Watt. Uh he kind of came in as a quoteunquote poor man’s TJ Watt, and he’s much closer to just being, you know, not peak TJ Watt, but what TJ Watt is today as a a smaller but hyper twitched up edge rusher that can win in so many different ways. I think you could argue Highmith actually has an even better bowl rush. He doesn’t quite have the legendary cross chop, dip, and rip move that TJ Watt has. Um, but he’s got a little bit of a power element to his game. Just like TJ Watt, he’s excellent against the run. And Heismith has that signature inside spin move that is one of the prettiest looking spin moves when he hits it in the league. So, I’m a huge fan of Alex Highmith. And again, I left the up arrow off him. But there’s a world where you’re talking about having two true number one edge rushers here with these two guys. Um and and really the worst case scenario is you have two really good number TWs in what TJ Watt was last year and what uh we’re kind of projecting Alex Heismith as here. So that’s a really awesome starting point. This is every bit in the conversation for the best edge duos in the league. And then also like we got to throw Nick Herbig in there as well. He was just kind of a very similar prospect to Alex Heismith. He just was a undersized edge linebacker um that comes in in the mid rounds. Heismith was a third round pick. I want to say Herbig was a fourth round pick and Herbig hasn’t quite gotten all that playing time and he has not been able to show the early down contributions as a run defender that say Highmith and TJ Watt are so good at. Um but in terms of pass rushing efficiency, he’s got it dude. I mean, he had just 227 pass rush snaps last year. He had 27 pressures and seven sacks. That’s insane. And he has some combination of both TJ Watt and Alex Heismith’s skill set with an elite first step, excellent bend um to dip and rip around the corner. And he maybe is just scratching the surface himself. And um he is kind of in part like a little bit of the reason I was kind of taken aback by the TJ Watt contract. I know TJ Watt wanted his money and you want to keep your franchise legend healthy, but I didn’t hate the idea if Pittsburgh could have pulled it off to kind of play hard ball with TJ Watt and say, “Hey, you did show some regression last year. Prove to us that that’s not who you are now.” Because if if if Watt did take a step back again at 31 years old, I think there’s a world where Alex Icemith and Nick Herbig can be a very capable edge duo of the f of the future for this Steelers team. Um we’re not going to be able to probably see that vision played out with Nick Herbig. He might be turning into more of an interesting free agent in a couple of years that’s just frankly one of the best edge threes off the bench. Um, but as far as we’re talking about this Steelers team, to have a guy that maybe is coming into his prime and in a different situation, maybe would be emerging, kind of like we talked about maybe Malcolm Coun for the Raiders last year who has more of a runway to be an impact edge rusher. The fact that that’s your guy off the bench if you have injuries um or someone does get tired. Um, again, there’s there’s just only so many opportunities for him to get playing time because Highmith and Watt are guys you want. They’re off the edge on third downs and Herbig is not a great early downs player. Um, but what a luxury to have a Nick Herbig here. And then just keeping things in this edge group. Wrapping this up real quick, you got Jack Sawyer, fourth round pick. Um, you know, got a lot of buzz playing at Ohio State on that national championship team. He has the kind of unblocked strip sack on Quinn Eers in that Texas game. like he had a folklore about him, but in terms of his NFL prospects, I think late third, early fourth was kind of his correct range where I see a guy that is a crafty run defender. He’s got good feet. He He is just really good with his hands in general, but doesn’t really have any ways that you project him to win as a pass rusher from a physical skill set perspective. Doesn’t really have a great first step. He’s got okay bend. Doesn’t have a lot of, you know, a big bag of pass rush moves. doesn’t really have power, you know, like you need something to kind of build off of and he doesn’t really have anything other than just being good with his hands and kind of winning with effort. So, that kind of to me left him as more of a edge three type, which to me is more of, yeah, a late third, early fourth round pick. But, um, considering Nick Herbig doesn’t play the run well, uh, they wanted Preston Smith in this role last year, I think Jack Sawyer plugs right in there and can be a really nice kind of edge 3.5 for this team. And then beyond that, it’s, you know, you don’t need too much from these guys. Jeremiah Moon has played a decent bit. Eku Leota has been in the league a couple years now. He was kind of a thumper coming out of college. We’ll see if those guys make the team. But yeah, obviously this is one of the best and deepest edge groups in the entire league. Uh that is a big part of the defensive line overall, ranking third. But that’s not where you stop. I mean, we have three really interesting potential impact players on this defensive line for this upcoming season, but each of these pieces have some question marks about them to an extent. You feel really good about the general floor of what you’re getting from this group. But question marks in the sense of like can these guys all reach a best case scenario in which case you would have one of the best interior defensive lines in the league to complement one of the best edge groups in the league as well. Um so you start with Cam Hayward and full stop I could not have been any more wrong about what Cam Hayward was going to be for the Steelers in 2024. I saw a player at 34, 35 years old whose production had dipped off and you know I guess I’ll apologize for saying that I thought the 35year-old uh was just not what he used to be and then he comes out and really has a career year. 60 pressures, 10 sacks, continue to be a dominant force against the run as that sort of fourey base end that they like to use him as. He’s not a full-on like two gapping nose tackle in that sense. Though for his size, he can do that stuff better than you would expect. They don’t ask him to do that a ton. They ask Keanu Benton to do that much more. Um whether you agree with them doing that or not is a different conversation, but yeah, dude. Cam Hayward just kind of was an ageless wonder last year. Um but the fact is he turns 36 now this year. Can he repeat being one of the four or five best interior defensive linemen in the league as he was last year? Needless to say, like that’s got to be a question mark. I’m not projecting regression. I’m fully expecting that he kind of will be what he was last year, but you could see that uh you know, time, you know, father time catches up with everybody here. So that is for what it’s worth a question, but he’s still fantastic. And then Keanu Benton heading into year three now. He is fascinating because he was basically the same player in year two that he was in year one, which isn’t a problem necessarily. He was really exciting in year one, but you know, I kind of hinted at it. He’s someone that they asked to play a lot of nose tackle and he’s just not great at it. He’s not the biggest guy. He doesn’t necessarily have the size for it. He’s a little bit taller. he can let run defender uh run blockers get up and under his pads and I think he is probably the biggest detractor from the overall run defense. They still ranked top 10 but it was a B-grade for the Dline run defense. Can he get better at that role in year three? That’s a big thing to look for. And then on top of that honestly like his ability as a pass rusher when he wins it is dynamite. He has a variety of quick hitting pass rush moves. He has really a good get off and the ability to cross your face. He’s got a swim move. He can rip past you. I’ve seen him win with cross chops before. Like he has dynamic pass rushing ability. But you look back on the season and it was 23 pressures and two sacks on the year. Um playing even a little bit more than he did in his rookie season. And in his rookie season, 24 pressures and a sack. um you know, he’s he’s got it in there, but it’s if you really just look down the board, man, it’s like for the most part, one pressure per game and you just want more than that from him. I know that he’s capable of it, but it’s it’s time. Like, can we get this unlocked here? I would love to see it. And maybe another piece in this D line with a little bit more pass rushing focus like a Derrick Harmon compared to a Larry Oen Joby. maybe he does draw a little bit less attention on these double teams and they’re able to isolate him um to win in the way that he can more often. But I do still put the up arrow on Keanu Benson. But if it doesn’t happen this year, I think we can kind of say we know mostly what he is where he’s more of just this enticing splash player who’s potentially being asked to play out of role a little bit. I still disagree that the Steelers should be using him as a nose tackle, but I don’t think that’s going to change as we talk about Derrick Harmon here because Harmon very much is going to replace those Larry Oen Joby snaps as more of that penetrating three technique role. Um, and Harmon is even smaller than Keanu Benton is. In fact, Harmon size-wise is not too far off of Cam Hayward. And I think they view Harmon as the long-term Cam Hayward replacement on this defensive line. But for now, the fact that they have two guys in that profile is pretty freaking insane. But a really good draft pick uh to bring in Derk Harmon. I’m glad they went this route. There was a lot of talk about Shadur Sanders potentially. Um or even like going like Amarian Hampton who would have come off the board. Uh no, he would have been there. But um like to get Caleb Johnson who’s a perfect scheme fit instead in the third round instead of going with an American Hampton who was another common mockd draft pick and then grab a Derek Harmon a legit first round Dline prospect where certainly in time you’re going to need to replace Cam Hayward. He can’t play forever I don’t think. Um but yeah really nice draft pick. He’s he’s a true doit all three technique along the defensive line or a four eye or a base end. they’re going to be able to kind of move him between the outside of the guard and the kind of head up on the tackle depending on the formation they want to play. Uh but yeah, really athletic dude, really good balance athletically speaking. Like he tested well in terms of the athleticism, but you also talk about like contact balance for defensive linemen is really important in the same sense we talk about it with running backs where you are going to get bumped and smashed in odd odd angles from 300 pound offensive linemen. So to be able to kind of absorb it whether it’s in your chest or in your hips or even against like cut blocks when people go down low on you to have that athletic balance uh is really important too and he’s got that. He wins with a bunch of different rush moves and the fact that he does have a bull rush I think is everything for Derrick Harmon because he he will cross your face and I think there’s a lot of opportunities for him to develop more of a a pass rushing bag so to speak. Um, but he he is really good with his hands on swipes and that kind of stuff. But if he can develop a cross chop, for example, like that’s in there for him to really terrorize offensive linemen and he’s got some great mentors. I mean TJ Watt is probably the best cross chop artist in the NFL. Um, so that’s one move like that could really take his game to the next level. But I think because of some of that balance we talked about um with his athletic profile, he’s good against the run as well. There’s room to improve there. But yeah, you’re very optimistic for Dererick Harmon. My pro comp on him was Christian Barour at the end of the day. Barour’s had some health issues in in recent seasons. But, you know, he’s he’s kind of a number one defensive tackle when when Bar has been fully healthy. So, if they can locate that in Derrick Harmon, hell yeah. And if that can happen this year, double hell yeah. So, you can really see the upside with this defensive line. There is a world where obviously this is the best overall defensive line, but this could damn well even be the best interior Dline and the best edge duo. And if that happens and and even the best edge three in the league on top of that with Nick Herbig maybe um if that all happens like yeah it there’s going to be some times where it doesn’t even matter how Aaron Rogers plays and this could feel I I mean just drawing some parallels with like Pton Manning and those Denver Broncos defenses when Payton won his second Super Bowl like if it’s going to happen I’m not saying it’s going to happen but if it’s going to happen I think it’s hitting all of these green lights on the defensive line this being the best defensive line we’ve maybe maybe ever seen in Pittsburgh and this maybe becoming the best defense in the league. Um, but let’s rip through the Dline depth. All these guys are going to play. I think they’re going to carry a lot of these guys on the roster. Um, and you know, these guys going to have to scratch and claw to make the team. So, you got Isaiah Louderdermilk has been kind of the hybrid end backup to Cam Hayward that they like. He’s done a good enough job in that role. Not really much to say about that, but he’ll play some base defensive end on early downs. They bring in Yaya Black. This one does fascinate me because like I said, I just don’t think Keanu Benton is a nose tackle at at his heart of hearts. Well, Yaya Black is a nose tackle. Um I don’t know that he’s ready to play it in the NFL right away. He just has got to get better with his pad level. But sizewise, coming out of Iowa fifth round pick, maybe you could get some good coaching into him quickly and um you know, improve your overall run defense by not having to force Keanu Benton to do that. And then maybe Keanu Benton can be a little bit more fresh to get after the quarterback on passing down. So, I’m at least fascinated there. But I’m not a huge fan of Yaya Black’s tape at the end of the day. And it’s not like he wasn’t getting great coaching at Iowa either. So, we’ll see where that goes. Uh Dean Lowry was brought in last year as well. He’s a pass rushing backup defensive end. He will play in emergency situations if he makes this team. Logan Lee was very much in Dean Lowry’s player archetype. Um I’d be interested to see what year two of development can look like him uh for him. Athletic guy. Um, so you know, Louderm Milk, Lowry, Logan Lee, and even De Marvin Le, uh, all kind of that hybrid and role. So, you’re probably not going to keep all these guys, but I like that you’ve got competition for all those dudes. And then Daniel Awal, I I bet makes this team. He put on some pretty decent tape for New England last year as an early down run defender. And, um, yeah, I just I think he’s a I think he’s a frisky player. So I wouldn’t be surprised if they look at him as the best run defender off the bench for them in which case he would make the team. And then there’s even some other guys scratching and clawing for for roster spots here too. But um pretty deep group at that point. So yeah, this defensive line is freaking awesome, man. I’m not going to spoil it quite yet, but the Steelers overall defense does come in quite high here. And uh the the Dline here is the biggest reason for that obviously. Um, but let’s keep moving forward into the second level with these linebackers. I just saw today that Patrick Queen made the uh NFL top 100 list. So, me basically coming out and saying that he’s just an average player here in this portion of the video. Probably going to get some hate from Steelers fans. He has immediately become quite overrated with that placement. I disagree firmly with that. Um, but before we get into that, let’s talk about the offseason changes for this group. They do let Alandon Roberts go, who played a pretty core role for this team last year, basically allowing Payton Wilson to do what he does as a coverage player without seeing the downside of that rookie in run defense. Landon Roberts was full stop, I would say, a top 10 rundefending linebacker for this Steelers team last season. He would come off the field on pass uh passing downs. So, they’re losing that piece now. They got some cheaper insurance there. And Malik Harrison coming over from Baltimore. There’s a world where Malik Harrison could play that early down rotational run defense role for them, but not as proven in that role as what Atlanta Roberts did for them last year. So, I do say slightly downgraded. Um, but I I’m not really worried about it as we um come back to this group here. I I think with Payton Wilson in year two, he is now going to have an opportunity to, you know, show that he can be more of a three- down linebacker. And if he can’t, then yeah, we’ll get into more of that rotation with Malik Harrison playing the Alandon Roberts role. But that that setup does give them a decent floor just like we saw last year. Yeah, Roberts couldn’t cover and Pton Wilson couldn’t defend the run, but by being smart about playing it uh LB by committee and rotating that LB2 spot, they worked around it just fine. So, because of how they played it last year and with those bodies in there, at no point am I going to be worried about the Steelers linebacker room. Um, but they don’t rank terribly high right now. They rank as my 24th overall linebacker room. They are inside the top half for linebacker coverage. I’ll give them that. Ninth to 14th in that regard. The combination of Patrick Queen and Pton Wilson could even be a special group in terms of coverage from the middle of the field. Um, but the linebacker run defense grade is quite lower. They do come in 27th to 28th despite what we said about Malik Harrison potentially being able to help them out in terms of run defense. But let’s circle back to Patrick Queen who I already kind of poked some fun at. You know, he’s he’s not a top 75 player in the NFL. He’s makes that top 100 list. He’s he’s probably not in the top 200 or top 250, frankly. He’s an okay average linebacker, better in coverage than he is in run defense. And he’s just he is just an aggressive heat-seeking missile without a targeting system. So yeah, when you have an athletic former first round pick that played at LSU whose highlight reel is going to be a lot of fun because he can absolutely detonate you with the hit stick. He can make some splash plays in coverage when he does guess correctly. Um but the the downto-own product from him is wildly inconsistent. He consistently finds himself out of position. He is undersized as well, so he struggles to take on blocks and because of that he kind of dodges blocks and again will find himself out of position a lot of times because of that. Um, so that’s where he is more of a below average run defender among NFL starters, which just isn’t great as your LB1. You know, when he was able to be the second linebacker in Baltimore, that was when he got to play his quote unquote best football cuz they really let to just, you know, they were really able to just let him loose. Roan could really do all the hard stuff and Patrick Queen could just play Seball, get ball. Baltimore obviously decides that that’s not worth $13 million a year. They let him go. Pittsburgh does bring him in. And at the time that contract didn’t seem terrible because I felt like the linebacker market was about to spike. I still think it’s going to spike, but now a year later that is still one of the highest paid linebackers in the league and that has come as a bit of a surprise, I think. But, um, you know, I wouldn’t say he’s worth $13 million a year. And this year, uh, he actually climbs up to being a $17 million cap hit and next year as well. So, he is quite expensive here, more than I’d like to pay a guy that has as many bad plays as Patrick Queen does. But, um, he still will have good games in coverage. It’s just very weak to very polarizing in that sense. And then yeah, you like his energy around the line of scrimmage. He is a psychopath at times and um I think that leads to him not being a complete and utter liability against the run as well despite some of those deficiencies we’ve said. So yeah, I think Patrick Queen is probably one of the 30 best linebackers in the NFL, just as unfortunately um anytime a guy becomes so highly paid and now uh is discussed as a top 75 player in the NFL in accordance to that horrible list that I do want to make a video about very soon, by the way, reacting to that list once it’s all final. um you know, we we the narrative does change um unfortunately, but that’s that’s where I’m at on Patrick Queen. Honestly, Pton Wilson is who I’m way more excited to see this year in year two. I just love how the Steelers played this in year one because coming out of NC State, Pton Wilson was absurdly athletic, moves so well in coverage, he’s got the reach, he’s, you know, about 6’4. Uh, and when NC State did drop him into coverage, it looked like he really had a feel for uh, you know, route development and zone IQ and all that stuff. U, but the thing was NC State used him really off the edge a bunch, like over half his snaps if I recall correctly. So, for a guy that does have a bit of a thinner frame, I was really worried about how he was going to defend the run coming out the gate. Um, this was a pretty hyped up draft prospect that ended up going closer to where I perceived his value, but even a little bit later. I think I had him as a late second, early third round kind of guy. Um, and he ends up going in the third round to the Steelers, but now heading into year two, I I would love to see him bulk up a little bit. And Steelers fans, I would love to hear from you guys if there are reports that maybe he is adding 5 10 pounds of functional muscle cuz I just I felt like he needs a little bit more to take on blocks and be more of a full-time linebacker. Um, but now I think an opportunity at least to be more of a full-time starter for this team. I I love how they rotated him off the field on early downs and put him out there to just do what he does well uh and run around and make plays in coverage. I mean, he had a pick covering Justice Hill on a wheel route in that Ravens game that was crazy. I mean, a little bit of luck that he was able to kind of reel that ball in, but just lock down coverage against a really fast running back like that. And one of the hardest routes to defend in the league is an athletic running back running a wheel route out of the back field. he played that perfectly. Um, so like you know it’s all in there and it wasn’t just that play like he was really good in coverage all year long being able to just kind of focus on that. But he’s going to potentially have a lot more on his plate or maybe they will just continue to go with this rotation and put Malik Harrison in there. But I do think the upside is there for Peyton Wilson to become more of a LB1 a threeown player and his the sky is the limit for this guy. his physical tools are insane and he has the length to fill out a little bit more. So, I’m really excited for him and if he can take that leap, uh, this would be more of a differencemaking group of linebackers, frankly, because like I said, if Patrick Queen can be an LB2, you love that him having to be an LB1 is a different conversation. But, yeah, as far as the depth goes, we’ve kind of mentioned it with Malik Harrison as kind of that thumper guy that they’re bringing in. I I agree with the addition. You know, I think he can do a lot of the stuff Roberts has done. He just doesn’t have the time on task and the sample size to prove that he’s as good as a Landon Roberts, but more in that role versus in Baltimore where they’ve kind of bounced him in in and out of an edge role as kind of an early down edge player where he’s really good at getting off of blocks. But he was a fascinating linebacker prospect coming out. I do like the sort of post rookie contract uh linebacker signing in general. These are the types of players that a lot of these guys do figure out year five, year six and become really nice players. So there’s a world where Lee Harrison could be a breakout player for this team too, but the path for that is much more limited with Queen and Wilson ahead of him. Um Cole Hulkcom, you have to at least mention him. He’s a very good, very balanced, smart linebacker if he could ever stay on the field. Uh, unfortunately that just, you know, that has not been the case for him in his entire NFL career. But if he’s healthy and available for a week when you you maybe Queen or Wilson miss a week, if Hulkcom’s healthy, that’s a great backup to be able to step in until he probably gets hurt again. Um, sad but true. U, Mark Robinson’s played a little bit. He’s an okay run defender, I think, for what he is as a LB5 in this group. And then they did draft Carson Bruner in the seventh round. and I didn’t get around to Carson Bruner’s tape. Um, but a decent tester out of Washington will probably make the team as a special teamer and we’ll see what he can be in time. Um, so yeah, there’s your group of linebackers. A lot of potential there, especially with Payton Wilson. It’s not a bad group. It’s not going to destroy this group though from a run defense perspective. Um, there’s just a lot of better tandemss in the league that are able to get off blocks and get to the run than the Pittsburgh Steelers. And you know, the Steelers were still 13th, I think, in overall defensive DVOA against the run last year, you know, having a Patrick Queen in there. And even at times, you know, Pton Wilson did get some run defense snaps. Like, yeah, there’s there there are uh drawbacks to this group in that phase of the position. But from a coverage angle, really no complaints. And the arrow could be absolutely pointing up as well, where Pton Wilson has the potential to be one of the best cover linebackers in the entire league. Um, but let’s talk about this very new look secondary. Um, this is where things start to get pretty damn exciting because we hyped up the defensive line in a way where they might have the best defensive line in this era of Steelers football. Um, but at the same time, their secondaries have been really mediocre for multiple years now. Feels like three, four, five years. The Steelers secondary has just been nothing to really write home about. And I think there’s a chance for this to actually be a top 10 differencemaking secondary for the Steelers. There are some question marks here. Um, but again, I think this is the best and deepest group they’ve had in a long time, especially at cornerback. We do need to review the moves they did make here, a lot of them here. So, at cornerback, I do say this group, obviously based on what I just said, massively upgraded. They do lose Dante Jackson, who played threequarters of games last year, was okayish. Um, also Cameron Sutton, um, no longer the player he used to be, plus some added off-field drama compared to earlier in his career. Um, so nothing major in terms of losses, but with the additions, they get Jaylen Ramsay in the trade. I already mentioned I’d love the trade for them. We’ll continue to glaze this move in just a second. Uh, they add Darius Slay from Philadelphia. Even before they added Jaylen Ramsey, they added Brandon Eco into the mix here and a seventh round pick in Dante Kent. So just major major additions to the quarterback. One of the more upgraded units in the entire league in my opinion. Now the addition of Jaylen Ramsey did come at the added cost of trading away Minka Fitzpatrick. I don’t think he is the player that a lot of fans think he is at this stage in his career or at least the impact he’s given this team the last two years. He hasn’t really been that top 10 safety that he once was. Um but still a loss nonetheless and he played 99% of their snaps last year. They also lose Damonte Kezy, who played a rotational dimeback role for them. The only additions are Juan Thornnehill at this point, a journeyman veteran, and Sebastian Castro, a UDFA addition that I am excited about, but it is a UT UDFA addition. So, while they got massive upgrades in the quarterback room, and I’m optimistic for this secondary, as we’ll continue to talk about, um, they did get downgraded in the safety room, but I would rather be better at corner than at safety. And let’s get into it. and talk about this quarterback room. Uh, I’ll start with Jaylen Ramsay because this is the big addition here. And, you know, I I think people acted like the Dolphins won that trade for some reason. Um, people continue to think that Ma Fitzpatrick is like a top five to 10 safety, whereas the tape and the production the last two years would tell you otherwise. And then people like to act like Jaylen Ramsay is washed, whereas again the tape definitely tells you a different story there. I mean, is Jaylen Ramsay what he was in his prime? No. But I don’t think he’s that far off of it either. I still see a guy that has plenty of speed to prevent getting stacked over the top. He is still, I think, the best rundefending quarterback in the NFL. He has probably he’s he’s at worst top three in terms of zone IQ and top five in terms of ball skills. This is still a top 10 cornerback in the NFL. So to flip a top 15 safety really is what Mink has been the last two years for a top 10 corner and a upgrade at tight end. I think that’s a win for the Steelers. And frankly, you could argue that Jaylen Ramsay has more long-term uh sustainability for this team if he is to earn a contract extension than even Minka Fitzpatrick. Whereas Minka has already shown aggression at safety at 28, 29 years old. I think Jaylen Ramsay at this stage in his career is two years older, but comparable in terms of athleticism to a younger Minka Fitzpatrick. I think Jaylen Ramsey has a clear path to switch back to safety at some point and even within this season I think we might see Jaylen Ramsey play some safety. Um so let’s get into that and like his usage because I think it’s going to be very fascinating here and I think they have a really exciting vision here. This is a bit of a projection in terms of my conversation with how he’s going to get used but um I’ve got a pretty strong feeling that this is going to this is going to be how it goes. I really think they look at how Brian Branch was used in Detroit last year, who in his rookie season was a slot corner. Um, and then in his second season, Brian Branch played a lot more safety on uh early downs. Detroit runs more base 34 and 4-3 defense with four defensive backs on the field than anybody in the entire league. Like 40% they come out in base. So, in those looks, they made Brian Branch their safety because otherwise you’re taking your nickel corner off the field. So, it’s really treating that kind of apex defender, that star role, uh, which is the Nick Sabin title for basically his slot cornerback, uh, and treating that position as your starting nickel and your starting strong safety in base personnel. I firmly believe that is how they’re going to use Jaylen Ramsey and that is when he’s played his best football outside of like early in his career in Jacksonville where he was he was the best outside corner in the league. Um you know when he went to the Rams that was the other highlight of his career was being that that apex star role defender. I think Pittsburgh is going to plug Jaylen Ramsey right into that role where he immediately becomes one of the best slot corners in the NFL. And in what we’ll, you know, we we mentioned it off the bat, they played base defense about 25% of the time last year. That was top 10 in terms of base defense rates in the league last year. Uh there’s going to be about 25 to even maybe a little bit more of that now that they have a Jaylen Ramsey. Um up to like 30% of their snaps. Jaylen Ramsey will be in many ways their strong safety. Not so much rotating and playing a deep free safety. We we’ll probably see that from time to time. If you get pre- snap motion, that kind of forces the Steelers to rotate um and adjust that way. I think Jaylen Ramsey can do that. Absolutely. I think going back to Florida State even he played some safety. Uh, so I definitely think this sets up really nicely for him to maybe get a new contract, go into age 32, 33, kind of like Devin McCordi did later in his career and and have an extended time here as a superstar defender for this Steelers team. But at least for this year, I think people are overreacting to the idea that Jaylen Ramsey has regressed um to any sizable degree. Yeah, he’s a little bit older. um not quite as twitchy as he once was where he was once one of the freakiest athletes in the entire league. Um but you come down from that a little bit and he’s still an above average athlete especially at his size for the quarterback position. So I’m really not worried about it. I think this is a great addition to this secondary and he’s a big boost to their run support as well. They were actually just kind of below average in terms of the DB run support. They had a C-grade there. They were in that third tier where they’re not really getting any help from their defensive backs against the run. Yeah, Deshawn Elliott’s pretty good at it. Um, but Beanie Bishop was okay in the slot last year, but not an impact in terms of the run defense. Um, struggled to take on blocks and tackle consistently. You can’t get a bigger upgrade than Jaylen Ramsay there. So, they jump up into the top tier now with him as your best rundefending uh defensive back. And then Deshawn Elliott, who is a very good run defender from the back end as well to clean stuff up. Um, but I I think I am higher on this addition than a lot of people, and I’m excited to see him in this defense. Um, but again, he is kind of your slot apex defender in this defense. That’s how I’m kind of treating him as a slot corner slash DB. He can of course step out and play outside corner if you have injuries or need to do that, but I do not think that is their plan. Um, so let’s talk about their starting outside corners. Joey Porter Jr., a big third year for him. And I also love now he has in this room he gets to learn from Darius Slay and Jaylen Ramsay. What a freaking benefit to Joey Porter Jr. who, let’s just face it, had his ups and downs in his second season. He did not take that step forward from year one where he was also pretty streaky. Um, but he was even a little bit worse in year two. I think he got flagged even more. already got flagged 12 times in his rookie season, but 17 times in 2024. Um, he’s always going to be a grabby corner. That is his play style. He wants to kind of model his game after say a Chavarius Ward or even like a Sauce Gardner um where he is going to get away with some of that grabiness. But I think learning from Jaylen Ramsey and Darius Slay how to be a little bit more subtle about it could actually go a really long way for him. I mean, getting flagged 17 times is just not going to work. Um, so I still think the up arrow should be pointing up obviously on Joey Porter, the first pick in the second round in 2023, who I thought was every bit a first round caliber corner. And in his rookie season, as far as rookie corners are concerned, he was he was better and very promising. So, I think he can get back on track. Um, it’s just getting some of that confidence and improving the technique with his grabiness a little bit more. Um, but needless to say, a big year three for him. We’ll see what they can get from him. Um, but then Darius Slay, I think this is a really good spot for him because when they do play that 25 30% of their snaps in that base defense, Slay is going to be able to get a breather. He’s going to be able to come off the field. he’s not going to be exposed to as many hits in the run game where I think you are more susceptible to injuries. Um, and he can just kind of play in space, come out as their third down um or passing downs corner. They’re um in many ways he is their nickel corner in the sense of he is the corner that comes in in their nickel packages if that makes sense. Though he will play outside, I think that’s a great spot for a 33-year-old corner that, you know, still showed he can play last year. another one of these guys that is he what he used to be? No, of course not. Darius Land his prime was a top five corner, but he was an elite athlete and you get a little bit older, you slow down a little bit, you lose a little bit of that athletic twitch, but you come down from athlet athleticism to still be a good enough athlete. He can still absolutely play. And there were moments in that Eagles playoff run where you’re just shaking your head like, dude, we forget about the fact that Darius Slay is like the ninth best defender on that Eagles defense last year and he’s still on many teams would be your CB1. So really just a nice addition. I I like that and I really like it um pairing it with the Jaylen Ramsey edition and how these two guys skill sets will be perfect together. So a really fun trio of corners and then they do have some depth. You know, Brandon E. Kohl’s was brought in here and was going to be competing for a starting job before they were able to land Jaylen Ramsay. He had some good snaps for the Jets last year. He’s got a lot of speed. He’s a young guy that was very raw coming out, but now out of his rookie contract, I think he was a decent dart throw to make. And now for him to be kind of a dime corner. If you have an opponent who has a speed threat at wide receiver, not necessarily like a Tyreek Hill per se, but maybe like a Marquez Vald scantling or even like maybe a Xavier Worthy for the Chiefs or even like you know Darius Sllayton like that that designated deep threat. If you’re worried about playing a lot of single high and leaving Joey Porter Jr. who’s got decent speed but not great speed or an older Darius Slay. If you’re worried about sticking that guy on an island with the speed threat of the opponent, you can be smart about it and rotate in Brandon Eles and and deal with the speed threats because he is a guy with like I I want to say he ran in the 42s if not the the low 43s. Um but a decent enough signing is depth for sure. You also have Beanie Bishop who I think they were relatively prepared to start in the slot that’s more in the realm of replacement level slot players that they’ve been living in for the last few years. They are quite happy to be upgrading there, but he has shown some real flashes in coverage. Aaron Rogers is certainly happy uh that he doesn’t have to throw against Beanie Bishop in a real game uh cuz he baited him in their matchup last year on a really beautiful interception, but he’s now good depth. You wouldn’t love him as a starter, but yeah, good depth. Um and then James Pierre has played as well. He’s kind of a nice backup to Joey Porter as a, you know, a physical scrapper at corner. You even have Cory Trice who if he could stay healthy could be a matchup corner. An interesting uh draft pick that would have gone much much higher if he didn’t have medical concerns coming out. Unfortunately, those have followed him in the league, but if he could stay healthy, uh I would imagine they could find a way to use him. And then Dante Kent, they spent a seventh round pick on profiles as a slot player, but tested really, really well. Uh so a lot of depth in this quarterback room. Not all these guys are going to make it, frankly. Uh so we’ll see how that all plays out. Now, I do think this is a top 10 secondary strictly off of the cornerback trio, but they fall into that next tier where they do rank 12th to 14th for the DB coverage grade. Um, they fall into that next tier because the safety group just isn’t really anything special. They extend to Shawn Elliot after he was a nice pickup for them. I love the physical presence he brings to this team. He’s more of a contribution in run defense than he is in coverage, but he made some really impactful stops coming downhill. I do think he’s going to play a lot more free safety this year, which is fine. Um, but he’s not going to show a ton of range or playmaking ability on the back end. It’s probably going to be very much like, hey, go play deeper than the deepest. Don’t take a ton of risks. Find yourself in a position and secure the tackle. Um, so I just don’t think he’s going to be that big of an impact, especially on passing downs. But yeah, he’s still a good overall player. Just doesn’t really move the needle. And then yeah, Juan Thornhill’s your other safety was just very kind of adequate for Cleveland. played a lot of slot corner in college. He’s got the traits, but has never really put it all together consistently from a coverage perspective and is far from an impact as a run defender. Though he’s solid there, I think for him to be your second safety that comes in on nickel defenses, which is going to be about 70% of the time, it’s okay. Um, but again, I do expect Jaylen Ramsay to be safety too in their base defensive looks. Honestly though, where this could go up is Sebastian Castro, my dude out of Iowa, who I think finished as my number six safety in this draft class. I had a late third, early fourth round grade on him, and I couldn’t believe he went undrafted. The amount of guys that just ran fast, you know, that got drafted at this safety position ahead of Sebastian Castro, who has multiple years of just really good tape. I get it. He’s a little bit smaller. He played a lot a lot of slot corner at Iowa. Yeah, he ran a 458. You know who also runs a 458? Most of the best safeties in the league. You know, Jesse Bates, Kyle Hamilton, Xavier McKini. Ever heard of those guys? Yeah. Speed is not as important at safety as you think. So, the fact that he went undrafted is unbelievable to me. Um, to pick him up as an undrafted free agent out of Iowa, the Steelers have had a strong connection to that program over the years. And like, can you not just picture it? I mean, there is such a long run of players coming out of Iowa that did essentially the same role. Whether it’s Ammani Hooker who’s turned into a good safety for the Titans, Micah Hyde, Gino Stone had a little bit of a breakout in this division for the Ravens. Like, I see Sebastian Castro somewhere in that cluster. And if he earns a starting role over Juan Thornnehill in training camp, you heard it here first. I think he provides better depth than people realize because he was an undrafted free agent, but this was to me one of the undrafted steels in the entire league and I would absolutely love to see him carve out a role here because I think he can play that slot safety role that I think Juan Thornhill projects into. Castro should be more than comfortable doing that. So, big fan of that addition. And then you got Miles Kilbru who’s been around here. He’s played a little bit on defense, but more of a special teams presence and Quindell Johnson. I still think they could entertain adding another safety to this group, whether it’s a Julian Blackman or something like that. Um, I think Justin Simmons is still hanging out there. There’s not really any needle movers out there that I would even consider too much of an upgrade over Juan Thornhill. Um, but to at least have a little bit more certainty in terms of depth might feel comfortable for the Steelers. So, um, just get ahead on that if in case they do add somebody because other than Castro, they don’t really have any depth. I do consider Kibru more of a specialteamer, but yeah, just to recap, they come in 12th to 14th for DB coverage. Room for that to go up. If Joey Porter can take a leap, uh they could certainly get into the top 10. And then maybe, yeah, Sebastian Castro, too, could be a surprise. But they are inside the first tier of teams for DB run support um in the top eight of NFL teams in that category thanks to the Jaylen Ramsay edition. But I hinted at it earlier. The Steelers do come in quite high for my overall defensive ranking. Second in the NFL, second in pass defense with that outstanding pass rush and then a little bit lower, eighth in run defense, which is kind of emblematic of where they were last year where they were seventh in pass defense and 13th in run defense. I think with some of those additions on the Dline, um, bringing better secondary players into this, it makes sense how they could be even better than they were last year. And this absolutely could be the best defense in the NFL. They’re already not far off of it and they have lots of guys with the arrow pointing up and a good coaching staff to get them there. Let’s discuss the special teams now before we tie everything together here. Um, in terms of offseason changes with the special teams um to round out our offseason changes graphic, really no changes here, although they might release Cordurell Patterson. He’s a roster bubble guy. um because frankly he is 34 years old and isn’t the kick returner um honestly like a legendary kick returner, arguably the best kick returner in NFL history. Reminder I said kick returner, not punt returner to the Bears fans listening. Um but yeah, he just is getting older and if he doesn’t quite have the traits that he once had, he might end up getting released here. So that could be a potential um loss quote unquote from what they had last year. though he he didn’t really do much um in terms of kick returns last year. He did return some kicks, but didn’t do much with them. Uh but at the end of the day, the Steelers rank out really well for my special teams formula. They come in as my second overall special teams. Um so that comes from the PFF team grade from last year where they were 11th in the NFL. The DVOA team grade, they were second. Um their kicker grade with Chris Boswell, uh he had the second overall grade there. So, very favorable in those metrics. Um, the punter is a little bit lower. We’ll actually kind of see who is the punter for them between Cameron Johnston and Corus Weightman. Looks like they’re going to have a little bit of a camp battle there. Um, but that kind of is what it is. I’m not really worried about it, but you don’t have any star punters in the building. So, they they came in 22nd for the overall punter grade. Um, the returner grade is solid. You know, sixth to 13th kind of B-grades across the board. you know, Corderell Patterson, we we mentioned him getting older, not quite what he used to be. Uh, but then Kelvin Austin is an excellent punt returner as well. So, they do have some return man in there. I think between Austin and maybe Kenneth Gainwell uh could step into the kick returner roles. Like, they’re going to still have some good contributions from the return men. And then they also have uh that top five overall coaching culture ranking as well that we mentioned off the bat. Um, that is a benefit of the doubt slider that works in the Steelers favor here as well. So, excellent special teams here in Pittsburgh. But that takes us to our final team summary on the Pittsburgh Steelers. Let’s begin by recapping their strengths, weaknesses, and some of those pivotal wildcard factors for this team. So, this team does have legitimate strengths. The defensive line, no doubt, is already a strength and could be even better, which is crazy. Um, but the overall coaching and culture is definitely a strength and has been a strength for this Steelers team. they have been the definition of earning the benefit of the doubt over the years and I would say they have more uh to work with this year than they have in years past. And then special teams as well as we mentioned is legitimate strength for whatever that’s worth. The beauty of the Steelers team though is they don’t really have defining weaknesses either as so many of our teams that we’ve revealed to this point have. You know, I think the au the ancillary wide receivers are are a potential issue when they have to get into their true drop back passing game. It’s DK Metaf and not a whole lot of other reliable down the- field targets. So, that could show up as an issue. And then the linebacker run defense, you know, it’s it’s not enough to hold this team back from having a really good run defense. Again, we ranked them eighth for run defense as a team. Um, but even in kind of a dream year or two from Payton Wilson, it’s it’s still tough to imagine this team being great from that position against the run and maybe holds them back from having a lockdown run defense. Um, but then those critical wildcard factors that if things can come together could really help this team go on a run. Um, or inversely if some of the question marks on these units go in the wrong direction could lead to more of a disappointing season for the Steelers. I really just look at the trench play. Both the offensive line and the defensive line have questions to a degree, especially with the offensive line. Like there’s a downside to this group. If development doesn’t come with this unit, you are talking about an older immobile Aaron Rodgers back there behind a team that we ranked near the bottom in pass protection. So, you need that development to come along. But the developmental upside of that group, as we talked about, is outstanding. So, if that can be closer to a top 10 offensive line, which I don’t think is outrageous to suggest that as a possibility given how talented that unit is, um, yeah, that can really help this Steelers offense actually make some noise. Uh, and then the D line is a wild card, not necessarily with the the downside that we suggested with the offensive line potentially, but I think it is a wild card in the sense of like, okay, it’s a great unit right now. Um, but you do have some question marks there with age between um, Hayward and Watt with the regression he showed last year. Where do those things land? And then the two young pieces on the interior of the defensive line. Um, there is a wider range of outcomes for that defensive line. I think if things go wrong, you could see that group being more of a just a top 10 unit, in which case the defense isn’t nearly as potent as you would maybe hope. So, um, the Dline’s never going to be a weakness for them. Um, but there are some question marks with that unit as we’ve discussed. Um, so again, to wrap this all up, they ranked 25th offensively heading into next year, second on defense. I I do think with with the moves they made, they invited some upside here, they maybe opened up some added questions to this team, which leads to especially like the floor of having the 25th overall offense. Um but yeah, man, if this could be the number one defense in the NFL and if they could just be the 17th or 18th best offense in the league and um get some things to go right with the offensive line and Caleb Johnson to be good and Aaron Rogers to just play pretty well for them. I actually do think there is a needle to be thread for this to be the best version of this Steelers team that we’ve seen. It’s tough in the AFC. You got to get through Lamar Jackson, Patrick Mahomes, Josh Allen, and Joe Burrow. Two of which in your own damn division. Uh if this team was in the NFC, maybe they would have a clearer path to being a sneaky kind of championship contender. Um but we have seen teams surprise and go on a run and get some things to go their way in the playoffs and maybe maybe the tide could turn for the Steelers this season. Let’s finish up by taking a look at their schedule though and ask how how realistic that is. Um, you know, I I look at this and they do have an easy start to their schedule for the most part. I have them favored in five out of their first eight games and um just modest underdogs, not big underdogs in the other three against Minnesota at Cincinnati and Green Bay at home. Obviously, Rogers going to have a lot to play for in that game, but I do think this team can set themselves up well to start hot. I think they can start five and three or six and two relatively easy with with the way that their season’s starting. Um, but it’s the second half of the schedule where they’re going to have to really prove that they’ve um, you know, kind of hit some of these green lights with their question marks because things ramp up. You’ve got road games against Baltimore and Detroit and at the Chargers. You have to host the Bengals. You have to host the Bills. You have to host the Ravens as well. That’s the meat and bones of your schedule right there is the second half of the season. So things might get off to a peachy start for this team, but you know, certainly don’t take any victory laps if they start six and two because uh we’re saying it right now before the season ever begins. That’s almost expected. It’s how they finish the season that’s going to matter here. Their overunder, if you look at their Vegas odds, is eight and a half. And um based on the math with how hard the second half of their schedule is, they actually came in with the the math projection for this series lower than that at 7.4 wins. I’m not I would not touch the under for this team. I am not betting against a Mike Tomlin team to at least get to nine and eight. That said, it’s it’s not my favorite bet in terms of value because of how hard their division is and how the schedule is down the stretch. Honestly, where I think the value is on betting the Steelers might be those 40 to1 Super Bowl odds. I think you talk especially about how this defense is shaping up and how they could really surprise on that side of the ball and, you know, not just be a top 10 defense, but be an elite defense, be one of these kind of all decade types of defenses. It’s it’s not a guarantee that they can hit that, but if if things really go right with the D line in the secondary, it’s possible. It is possible. And in that case, you don’t need the offense to be special. You just need them to control the clock, run the scheme the way it’s designed, not be forced out of that game script because the defense is keeping games so close. And yeah, maybe they get a couple lucky bounces in the playoffs and this is the year. I I don’t know. Um, maybe that’s overly optimistic for this Steelers team led by a 41-year-old Aaron Rodgers. Uh, needless to say, I would love to hear your guys thoughts on today’s deep dive. How many wins do you think the Steelers get this year? Do you think this team could surprise this season? Um, but also, who do you think comes next with the number 18 ranking in this series? Thank you so much you guys for watching. We will see you within the next few days for that next deep dive. Until then, if you could hit that like button on the way out if you haven’t yet, it really does help me out. And I will see you soon. Peace out. [Music]

A comprehensive preview of the 2025 Pittsburgh Steelers! In this video, we’ll review Offseason Changes, the Coaching Staff, what the Offensive & Defensive Schemes will look like, how each position group stacks up against the rest of the League, and finally take a look at their schedule and win total expectations!

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Audio Versions of this show are posted on the “Fully Inflated Football Podcast” 24 Hours after the video is posted!

My QB Tiers

Tier 1 – Elite
QBs who give you a shot at a Super Bowl every year almost regardless of roster talent.

Tier 2 – Great
QBs who elevate their team who you would expect to win a Super Bowl in a 10-year window at their current level of play.

Tier 3 – Good
QBs who can get the most out of a great team and give you a shot at a Super Bowl as long kolas the team stays great around him.

Tier 4 – Fine (Split into Developing & Capped)
Clearly a starting caliber QB but are either in their growth stages as a prospect or have reached a ceiling that suggests you will have a very hard time winning a championship with this player.

Tier 5 – Fringe Starter (Split into Developing & Capped)
A QB flirting with the line of being one of the Top 32 QBs in the league. Is either a capped, bridge Quarterback for a team, or a talented, young QB with upside and at least a 1 year runway to show development on his current team.

Tier 6 – Backup (Split into Developing & Capped)
Either a veteran backup who has reached his ceiling, or an intriguing young backup who could surprise someday if given an opportunity.

QB Run Multiplier is for the Designed Run Game Only! Scheme & usage is heavily considered. The QBs
Scrambling ability is a part of my Passing grade and evaluation.

Team Formulas
Team Overall)
64% Offense | 35% Defense | 1% Special Teams

Team Offense)
64% Passing Game | 36% Run Game

Passing Game)
40% QB Passing | 30% Weapons | 21% Pass Blocking | 8% Pass Game Coaching | 1% Coach & Culture

Run Game)
45% Run Blocking | 32% Runningback | 20% Run Game Coaching | 3% Coach & Culture | QB Run applied as a Multiplier

Team Defense)
65% Pass Defense
35% Run Defense

Pass Defense
45% Pass Rush | 30% DB Coverage | 6% LB Coverage | 17% Pass Defense Coaching | 2% Coach & Culture

Run Defense
41% DL Run Defense | 30% LB Run Defense | 25% Run Defense Coaching | 4% Coach & Culture | DB Run Support applied as Multiplier

Chapters
Intro 0:00
Coach & Scheme 1:53
Quarterback 27:33
Weapons 37:55
Backfield 59:30
O-Line 1:06:44
Offensive Summary 1:18:06
Defensive Line 1:19:37
Linebackers 1:46:40
Secondary 1:56:41
Defensive Summary 2:14:10
Special Teams 2:14:50
Team Summary 2:17:04
Schedule & Win Total Projections 2:21:30