Good Tuesday to you Steelers fans.
Well, I really screwed up. And in turn I screwed up our most recent podcast. This is exactly what I get for trying to do too much during my final week of school. Grading and final exams clearly had my mind in the wrong place. I checked several times at nfl.com for this year’s OTA schedule. The final dates they had listed were as June 7-June 10. This made sense to me because with the Hall of Fame Game getting us into Training Camp early I assumed we’d have an earlier mandatory mini-camp. I should never “assume” as it clearly makes an “ass/u/me.” Well, not you but me. Maybe someday I’ll finally retire and spend even more time on this little hobby of mine. Until then, please accept my apologies. I expect better from myself.
OK so When IS the Mandatory Mini-Camp then?
It starts today and will run through Thursday. As of this writing T.J. Watt is expected to be in attendance.
Tweet of the Day… Derrick takes us back in time.
Roethlisberger's 1st start career start against the Cleveland Browns.
Cleveland selected Kellen Winslow Jr. ahead of him a few months earlier.
That 1st play is still ridiculous (no penalty/fine, either). pic.twitter.com/f1deioat0i
— Derrick (@derrick_daKidD) June 14, 2021
The Hype Train
Raise your hand if you’ve seen the Cleveland Browns be suggested as “Super Bowl Contenders” before. It’s happening again and they seem to be embracing it. Heck, why not? They’re coming off a huge win over us, their hated rival and they took Kansas City to the limit before losing in the Divisional Round. I will say as I’ve said many times. I always prefer being the hunter to the hunted. Let teams overlook us and let those same teams ride the hype train. The more attention they get the better.
Slot vs Wide
JuJu Smith-Schuster would prefer to play out wide. JuJu Smith-Schuster has been more productive from the slot. And so are the days of our receiving lives. With JuJu on a one-year deal there is no secret about the fact that he will be looking for a payday prior to the 2022 season. He likely thought that payday would have happened during this offseason but the market just didn’t bear that out. From his perspective, he needs to put up big numbers in an effort to make himself more marketable. From the Steelers perspective they need him to produce period. Chase Claypool is going to be almost exclusively aligned out wide. Diontae Johnson has flexibility like JuJu and James Washington is largely an outside guy as well. What we don’t yet know is how Matt Canada plans to utilize his offense. We have some solid ideas but like any coordinator he’s going to put guys in positions where they can most help the team. With as much motion as Canada uses, I suspect JuJu will once again be all over the formation. How often will be a week-to-week thing simply based on the matchups he may have with cornerbacks. This is something to revisit later in the season once things have started to unfold.
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Have a great day Steeler Nation!
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