Steelers Rookies Changing the Narrative? | Steelers Morning Rush
Welcome to Steelers Morning Rush, our new daily short-form podcast with Alan Saunders, giving a longer perspective on a single news topic surrounding the Pittsburgh Steelers or the National Football League. The Steelers wrapped training camp on Monday, and with their first test in the books, how did the team's 10 rookies from the 2026 NFL Draft perform, and did they do well enough to change the narrative about the underwhelming nature of the draft class? Alan breaks it down:#steelers #herewego #nfl CONNECT WITH STEELERS NOW: Steelers Now: https://steelersnow.com SN on Twitter: https://twitter.com/pghsteelersnow SN on FB: https://facebook.com/steelersnow SN on Insta: https://www.instagram.com/pghsteelersnow/
Video Transcript
Hey folks, good morning and welcome to another episode of Steelers Morning Rush.
I'm Allen Saunders.
It is Tuesday, August 18th, and I'm not at training camp, but I'm supposed to be.
It's also not morning.
Working, through the schedule changes the best we can, but a little bit delayed today.
No Steelers practice today.
There is Steelers practice tomorrow on the south side that was not scheduled, so we'll have that for you.
Me, Ed and Brendan there.
A normal Tuesday going forward anyway, with Afternoon Drive, me and Smitty, 6:00 here, YouTube, audio platforms.
Today I wanna talk about the Steelers rookie class and the way things went for them at training camp.
Duckburg had a good question.
By the way, I love, I love that name.
On, on yesterday's pod: Seeing the rookies at La Trobe and in the preseason, do you think the fans and media were too quick to judge the impact these rookies will have on the season?
Other than Dunker, I could see most of the rookies seeing PT.
Just very clear, I mean, I'm not speaking for the rest of the media, I'm not speaking for the fan base, just for myself.
I was very critical of the Steelers draft process.
That doesn't mean I think all the players are gonna be bad.
That means that I think there were better ways to go through the draft where they could have come up with better players.
That doesn't mean they're all not gonna be good.
Some of them will be good.
The Steelers came into this year's draft class with the seventh most accumulated draft capital.
When they left the draft, I felt very certain that they were not going to end up with the seventh-best class of this year's draft, and I still feel that now, and therefore I don't think they did a very good job.
Do-- Now, another part of the reason that I didn't like this draft class is that I don't particularly see a lot of upside in a lot of the picks they made.
I think 10 rookies is too many, and I felt like they should've traded up and tried to maximize their chances of someone making an impact.
As things stand right now as we enter the season, or enter the, the second week of the preseason, the only rookie that is currently in a position to play on anything other than, to play on offense or defense is Jeremy Bernard.
Max Ahonatuor, unfortunately dealing with this neck injury, is not going to play in the second preseason game, and that almost certainly means he's not going to start the season in the starting lineup.
We'll see if at some point he is able to overcook Dyl- overtake Dillon Cook.
Don't overcook him.
But we'll see.
I mean, it's, it's very much TBD.
I don't think Jennings Dunker or Drew Aller, will play at all this year.
I don't think Dalon Everett will do much beyond special teams.
I don't think Robert Spears Jennings will do much beyond special teams unless there's an injury, and I'm not even 100% sure he's making the team.
I don't think Wiegand will do much beyond special teams.
Riley Nowakowski, we've seen, I don't know, maybe 10 snaps of fullback throughout the entirety of training camp.
He will be the fullback, but it doesn't seem like it's going to be a big volume role.
And then you got Wiegand.
Yeah, Wiegand will be the kick returner, but I don't expect him to play very much on offense.
Rubio I think will be the sixth or seventh defensive lineman, which is I mean, maybe he'll play and maybe he won't.
Maybe he'll have a helmet and maybe he won't.
Probably not.
I, I wouldn't think right away.
And then you'll have-- But I think he'll be on the team, and I, I don't think, Eli Heidenreich makes the team.
So, I mean, I, I think you're looking at extremely minimal contributions from almost the entire rookie class outside of Jeremy Bernard this year.
There are certainly some pieces to build on for the future.
I think Everett has looked very, very good and does look like a potential future starting cornerback, and not way down the road either.
You know, maybe in the near future.
The big problem is he's the sixth-best corner on the roster.
They, you know, he's just buried on that depth chart, and I don't see a way for him to escape that, this-- Even if they traded Jalen Ramsey, which I don't, I mean, I think could happen but I'm not expecting to happen, I still don't think he would find his way to the front of that line particularly quickly.
So yeah, I mean, that's, that's gonna be tough for him to overcome.
I, I feel like Spears Jennings is probably closer to the front of the line just 'cause safety is a much less deep position on the Steelers, but I don't think he's played pr- you know, so well that I, I think they're trying to get him into the game.
I just think they may need to use him more.
He'll certainly play on special teams if he's on the roster and active.
But, no, I, I don't think-- First of all, I don't think it's ever too quick to judge.
I think it's always fair to judge a process.
A-and certainly we should be amenable to changing our minds about things as we get new information.
But again, I wasn't ever saying that this, that none of this group of players could be good.
I just didn't feel like the Steelers maximized their chances of getting the best possible draft class.
And, you know, I don't see any signs right now of them having hit the lottery in a way that makes me think that's going to be different.
I do like Max Ahonatuor from what I saw from him when he was healthy.
I'd like to see more of it as we go forward.
And Drew Aller I think had a good preseason game but, I mean, that is a long-term project.
That is, you know, I, I would be a little bit surprised if he's even a serious contender to start next year.
You know, that's, that's a big, that's a big-picture project, that they're looking for there, and, and we'll see how it plays out.
I, I think the progress has been noteworthy, that's for sure, throughout the course of training camp.
In terms of his footwork and his mechanics, I think they still have a long way to go.
And I just, you know, one, one other point here that I think I've made before, Craig Jacobs says, "You think-- laughable the media guys who have the same knowledge as a billion-dollar company with a scouting staff."
Literally, the media guys have the knowledge of thirty-two scouting staffs.
That's where the media consensus ranks come from, is that we talk to people on teams and then get information from them, and the guys who are really good at it that do this full-time talk to all of the teams and talk to scouts on all the teams, and also scouts for the Senior Bowl and, and things of that nature.
And th-they're not-- it's not like Daniel Jeremiah is out there ranking his top prospects on a big board.
Th-that's what the league is telling us.
So I mean, that, that's where that information comes from.
It's, it's not-- I, I think there's this misconception that the consensus board is a media creation.
That is the media replicating the NFL's consensus based on largely inside information that is shared, you know, sometimes un-- you know, it sure seemed like last year, for example, the NFL really did a nice job of hiding its disdain for Desh-Shedeur Sanders.
But that's not the way things usually play out.
Usually, the media at large is able to get a pretty good judge of how the NFL at large thinks about players, and that's why, not because the media is expert at scouting, but that's why the consensus is a good judge for a draft class, because it is simply the league's consensus.
And so, that's, that's why that works.
So yeah.
I mean, I, I still generally down on the draft process this year.
Saw some things from, like, Gabe Rubio I didn't expect to see.
I think he's been very good.
Spears Jennings has been a work in progress, but you-- the, like, there's flashes that you like.
Jeremy Bernard, very good draft pick.
You know, I, I, I thought that from the beginning.
It doesn't have crazy high upside, but man, is he gonna be a good player.
And I, I think a lot to like there.
But yeah, in general, I, I, I think it-- the word I used when I broke down the draft class the day after was underwhelming, and I still feel that way about the return right now, and I probably will.
I, I, you know, there-- I unless Drew Aller becomes a starting corner-quarterback or, you know, I don't know, Jennings Dunker is a Pro Bowl guard or something like that, like, it's gonna be hard for that perception to shift, I would, I would say.
That's why I said it in the first place.
Good question.
And I like the, the back and forth there, so I wanted to address it.
That's it for this morning.
Let's get some more questions as we're gonna finish our wrap-up of training camp today on Afternoon Drive.
We'll talk about practice tomorrow, and then we'll get into the preseason, game for Friday-- for Thursday, and a live show on Friday.
So stay tuned for all that.
And more here on the YouTube channel, audio platform, you know where to find us, steelersnow.com for the written stuff.
Plus .steelersnow.com, get ready for our next live stream, which is next Wednesday.
And also today I'm working on, some notes from camp that'll be for subscribers only as well.
Until next time, thanks for listening, thanks for watching, and enjoy.
