The Pittsburgh Steelers new coaching staff have only been around players for two weeks. The group can\u2019t even take the practice field until Monday\u2019s voluntary minicamp. Still, first impressions matter. New Steelers coach and defensive coordinator Patrick Graham, one player has immediately stuck out.<\/p>\n
Speaking to reporters Friday, Graham singled out cornerback Brandin Echols.<\/p>\n
\u201cBrandin [Echols] is impressive,\u201d Graham said via a team-provided transcript when asked what player has stood out positively. \u201cI mean, I mess with Brandin already. I don\u2019t even know if I\u2019ve expressed that to him, but in the meeting room, I lock eyes with him a lot of times, and DeShon [Elliott].<\/p>\n
\u201cI meant not to single anybody out, but I would say I\u2019m really impressed with him and how he goes about his business. I like his energy in the meeting room. It\u2019s been fun talking football with him, asking them questions in front of the group. That\u2019s been really cool.\u201d<\/p>\n
The first two weeks of the offseason program, Phase One, are reserved for weight room work, rehab, and classroom meetings. Echols has managed to stick out in a strong and veteran secondary alongside the likes of Jamel Dean, Joey Porter Jr., Asante Samuel Jr., Jalen Ramsey, Jaquan Bisker, and DeShon Elliott.<\/p>\n
Echols has quickly become a forgotten name after Pittsburgh\u2019s offseason additions with more likely to be added during the draft. Inked to a two-year deal ahead of the 2025 season, he stood out positively through most of the season. Echols took lumps against the Los Angeles Chargers<\/a> and Houston Texans but overall, arguably had the best year of his career. He finished with 48 tackles, six pass deflections, one sack, and two interceptions. Easily his best numbers since his rookie year in which he started 14 games and played far more overall snaps.<\/p>\n His 2026 role is unclear. If Ramsey plays full-time safety, Echols could capture the starting nickel role. If Ramsey plays nickel in sub-packages, as was the plan to begin 2025, Echols\u2019 role will be far more limited. That\u2019s before considering any early draft pick that could compete for similar responsibility. That would make Echols great depth and likely a starting gunner on special teams to replace the departed James Pierre.\u00a0<\/a><\/p>\n However, if Echols keeps impressing Graham the rest of the way, he could find himself in the lineup in some capacity. Echols being back in a contract year is only added motivation for him to make 2026 even more successful than 2025.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Pittsburgh Steelers new coaching staff have only been around players for two weeks. The group can\u2019t even…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":766407,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[2026],"tags":[12009,7,14269,57,691],"class_list":{"0":"post-869389","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-football","8":"tag-brandin-echols","9":"tag-football","10":"tag-patrick-graham","11":"tag-pittsburgh-steelers","12":"tag-trending"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/116427479026624419","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/869389","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=869389"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/869389\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/766407"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=869389"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=869389"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=869389"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}