Steelers 2-a-days: CB Levi Wallace a returning starter, RB Jaylen Warren might get bigger role
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Editor’s note: From the end of minicamp through the day the team reports to training camp at Saint Vincent College, the Trib will be running through the Pittsburgh Steelers’ 90-man roster, assessing each player’s outlook for the 2023 season. The breakdown will go through the roster in mostly-alphabetical order, (at least) two per day, between June 16 and July 26. Contract data courtesy spotrac.com.
CB LEVI WALLACE
Experience: 6th season
Contract status: $5.48 million cap hit in 2023, scheduled for unrestricted free agency after season
2023 outlook: The Steelers revamped their cornerback position room in a big way. Six of the eight men who played cornerback for the Steelers in 2022 are gone, and Wallace joins only backup James Pierre as returnees. Pierre played fewer than a quarter of last year’s defensive snaps, and Wallace was part of a group that did last year’s heavy lifting (along with Cameron Sutton, Ahkello Witherspoon and Arthur Maulet) but the lone one to return.
Yet, Wallace’s role isn’t set in stone for 2023. He’s a heavy favorite to be the starting, every-down right outside cornerback, but as he enters the final season of his two-year contract with the team there is no guarantee he’s part of its longterm plans. As of now, over the summer Wallace moved to the right outside when veteran Patrick Peterson signed. While that was purportedly so that Peterson could take over on the left side, Peterson played more slot/nickel during organized team activities and minicamp. Rookie second-round pick Joey Porter Jr. was getting first-team reps at outside cornerback, and he surely was drafted to be a starter in the not-too-distant future.
That — seventh-round cornerback Cory Trice, too, is a wild card — clouds Wallace’s future. But Peterson is 33, so his Steelers tenure won’t last too long. And a scenario exists in which Porter and/or Trice either show unworthy or (at very least) unready to play immediately. So, don’t write off Wallace just yet as a starter in 2024 and beyond. Or for that matter, as an every-down player throughout 2023. Odds are, though, he’s now just a satisfactory average-to-slightly-above-average placeholder for some length of time.
In terms of distance traveled, Jaylen Warren relocated about 10 feet in the Steelers locker room.
The distance traveled in his young NFL career over the past year, however, might be impossible to calculate. https://t.co/8dqOzStXDd
— Tribune-Review Sports (@TribSports) June 8, 2023
RB JAYLEN WARREN
Experience: 2nd season
Contract status: $874,000 cap hit in 2023, signed through 2024
2023 outlook: Warren in 2022 had one of the best seasons for an undrafted Steelers rookie over the Mike Tomlin tenure. Playing almost 30% of the offensive snaps as a complement to Najee Harris, Warren had 105 touches (77 rushes, 28 catches) and accumulated 593 yards from scrimmage while averaging 4.9 yards per carry. Stats such as that might not always tell the full picture (it’s easy to rack up a good per-carry average when a bulk of your touches, say, come in situations such as draw plays on third-and-16). But the advanced analytics of Next Gen Stats, footballoutsiders.com and Pro Football Focus all rated Warren as the superior runner to Harris last season, too.
But while some fans clamor for Warren to take over the “RB1” role from Harris, that isn’t going to happen. First, Tomlin and the Steelers aren’t going to do that unless, over a larger sample size, Warren unambiguously outperforms Harris. Secondly, Warren likely can be more effective in smaller doses. But while a wholesale shift in role isn’t likely, Warren can and might well earn a bigger share of the playing time and carries. Unlike in 2021, when Harris led the league in touches, the Steelers might in 2023 prefer a more modern “two-back” approach in which Warren more often gets a full offensive series and/or a more defined role (for example) on third downs.
Regardless of exactly how his second season plays out, Warren has already proven a savvy signing as a 2022 undrafted free agent out of Oklahoma State.
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