Steelers defensive backfield loaded with talent headed into 2020
During the modified 2020 NFL training camp, Steel City Underground will be bringing Steelers Nation reports on positional groups while previewing those groups’ potential and predictions for the upcoming season.
The Pittsburgh Steelers got a big boost when they added Minkah Fitzpatrick and Joe Haden to their defensive backfield. During the 2019 NFL regular season, the Steelers also saw Steven Nelson and Cam Sutton emerge as top-tier cornerbacks in the league. Those are just four guys. The Steelers utilized a nice rotation, especially in the slot corner position, and the improvement in the defensive backfield paid dividends to the tune of 14-of-20 total team interceptions, four forced fumbles, five fumble recoveries, and two touchdowns. They combined for ten quarterback hits with Mike Hilton recording five. After experiencing a slump on the back end of their defense prior to last season, the fact that the Steelers have all of those core players back at camp this year bodes well for the 2020 NFL season.
“I am expecting to get eight. I had five last year. I easily could have had nine. I dropped four picks. Embarrassing. My goal this year is to have at least eight picks.” – Joe Haden
Thanks to a heads-up play by Bud Dupree, and pressure by Terrell Edmunds, in Week 3, just days after the Steelers acquired Fitzpatrick, Haden got a hand on a pass that helped set up the following play by the ‘newbie’.
The Steelers look set on the roster with Fitzpatrick and Edmunds as their starting safeties with Haden, Hilton, Nelson, and Sutton as their starting cornerbacks. They’re the presumptive guys at the top of the depth chart but that doesn’t mean anything is guaranteed.
Per Pro Football Focus, Sutton forced an NFL Passer Rating of 63.8, giving up just .58 yards per coverage snap, when lined up in the slot and ranked third among all NFL cornerbacks (minimum of 100 snaps), and Nelson was the Steelers’ top corner last season, earning an 85.0 overall PFF grade (6th among all NFL cornerbacks). When targeted, Fitzpatrick forced an NFL Passer Rating of 27.3 (second among NFL safeties). The Steelers were the only team in the NFL to have two corners in the top 8 of the league in coverage snaps per receptions (minimum 2oo coverage snaps): Sutton (16.2) and Nelson (16.1). Haden gave up just 0.82 yards, per coverage snap, in 2019.
“I think we’re going to look even better… We kept most of our defense from last year. And we have a lot of young guys that are going to help us from the back… I think we will be an even better defense than we were last year.” – Minkah Fitzpatrick
“Catching the ball, getting around the ball, stripping the ball, fumble recoveries, all those things we’ll just continue to practice them.” – Teryl Austin
That Pittsburgh has other talented defensive backs in camp, including players who’ve spent time with the team, is a boon; they’re likely to utilize the extra space on the practice squad in order to have a healthy rotation of depth after filling their final 53-man roster.
The guys battling for depth positions behind those presumptive starters are as follows: Justin Layne (CB), Alexander Myres (CB), Marcus Allen (S), John Battle (S), Antoine Brooks Jr. (S), Jordan Dangerfield (S), and Curtis Riley (S).
Senior defensive assistant/secondary coach Teryl Austin is enthusiastic about the potential his positional group has. “It’s kinda neat to watch the personalities with the guys,” Austin said in a recent Steelers.com interview. “It’s a really good group in terms of the different mixtures…I think I have a couple young guys who think they’re old in Minkah and ‘T’ (Edmunds). They think they’re like 35-year-old guys. And I have older guys like Joe (Haden) and Steve (Nelson) and they’re like rookies, they’re bouncing around in our (defensive backs) room.”
