Steelers Biggest Remaining Weakness? Slot Cornerback
After the NFL Draft concludes, the core nucleus of a team is already formed. There will be late acquisitions during the latter parts of training camp and preseason, but for the most part, what you see is largely what you get. The Pittsburgh Steelers have had a tremendous offseason thus far and, on paper, look noticeably better than the team that we last saw in early January.
Most, if not all, teams probably feel that same sentiment but with the Steelers, it feels justified after they've addressed most of their needs through free agency and/or the NFL Draft. There is one exception, however - slot cornerback.
Every offense or defense in the league has a weakness that opposing teams look to strategically target week after week. As of right now, if there's a position on defense worth being legitimately concerned over, it's in the slot because the options currently on the 90-man roster are pretty underwhelming, to say the least.
That void is the product of several factors but perhaps none bigger than Cam Sutton's departure earlier in free agency. While mostly a boundary cornerback in his final season with the Steelers, his inside/outside versatility was a great asset for defensive coordinator Teryl Austin, as he could be moved wherever Pittsburgh needed him that week.
It seems as if the Steelers simply weren't willing to pony up the same amount of money as the Lions were in order to acquire Sutton's services, and that is certainly an important decision worth looking back on in the future.
The other returning figure in this equation is Arthur Maulet, who's operated as the team's "early-down slot" in recent years. He's a player that is at his absolute best when playing near the line of scrimmage and attacking downhill, but the further that he is drawn away from that area, the more problems that begin to arise. The game where his limitations in coverage were really exploited was the second matchup last season against Cincinnati.
The Bengals are a spread-heavy team that likes to operate in the gun with three and four-receiver sets, but even without Ja'Marr Chase in the lineup, they decided to shift Tee Higgins inside to the slot to get him matched up with the likes of Maulet. They routinely attacked him over and over in this game, with him allowing six catches for 81 yards and a touchdown. The touchdown allowed happened on a rep where he was in solid position but was ultimately boxed out at the catch point by reserve wide receiver Trent Taylor.
Maulet is still on the roster currently, and he could certainly still fill a role defensively, but the Steelers are well aware of his athletic limitations. After this matchup against the Bengals, Maulet saw his snaps drastically reduced, partially because they faced heavier personnel teams, thus not needing a slot corner as often. But also because they began to shift Cam Sutton into the slot more, which is no longer an option moving forward.
Pittsburgh does indeed have other options worth exploring. Patrick Peterson has been vocal about what led him to sign with the Steelers early in free agency. He's brought up the idea that the Steelers are potentially looking at moving him around more, as he's mostly been a stagnant, outside cornerback throughout his career.
At 33 years old, the days of Peterson shadowing the opposing team's best weapon all over the field are long gone, but he sounds intrigued by the possibility of doing more than just playing on the outside.
What exactly could that entail? Well, other freakish cornerbacks such as Rod Woodson and Charles Woodson have made the late switch to safety in order to prolong their careers. Peterson has the body type and length to potentially become a tight end eraser in sub-packages whenever teams flex their guys into the slot. But to be clear, either of those deployments is going to be vastly different from what we're used to seeing from Peterson from an alignment perspective, so who knows what that could potentially look like.
Then there's the Steelers' latest acquisition, a former teammate of Peterson's, Chandon Sullivan. A bit of a journeyman as this is his fourth team in his six years as a pro, Sullivan was the Vikings' primary slot cornerback last season. Full disclosure- the results were not great. Calling Minnesota's defense a catastrophic disaster would be selling it short, as there were frequent coverage busts all over the place as this was a unit that quarterbacks had a field day against week in and week out.
As for Sullivan specifically, PFF charged him with allowing 796 receiving yards when covering the slot, by far the most in the entire NFL. A caveat that remains relevant with Peterson as well, the Vikings' defense is drastically different from what the Steelers ran last season. Minnesota was perfectly content to play two-high structures with their cornerbacks sagging seven-nine yards off of the line of scrimmage in off-zone coverage. Compare that to the Steelers' preference for press-man-heavy looks from last season, and there's not that much carry-over here.
That could be a good thing. It's pretty rare for guys to be signed on draft weekend and immediately have a clear path to starting on either side of the ball, but the opportunity clearly exists in this scenario.
Pittsburgh has done well to replenish their cornerback depth after drafting Joey Porter Jr. and Cory Trice during the NFL Draft. However, both of those guys are strictly outside cornerback specific and likely won't be able to shift inside to help alleviate this particular problem. Perhaps the board simply never aligned for the Steelers to consider one of the many slot-capable corners in this draft class. But even having said that it's nearly impossible to be upset with how the overall haul that they exited the weekend with.
While they won't be adding any compensatory picks, Pittsburgh still has all of their remaining selections in the 2024 NFL Draft, meaning they still have resources available to them if a potential upgrade were to become available. Every year when training camp and preseason get underway, younger players end up pushing veterans for playing time, leaving the more older, more expensive players expendable. Pittsburgh should certainly be monitoring those situations closely.
With increased passing rates, more spread looks, and more offenses shifting their best targets inside to the slot to dictate matchups, the slot corner position is more important than it has ever been. There's still plenty of time before kickoff on opening weekend, but if this is the group that they plan to run out there at that time, there's a decent possibility that this will be the defense's biggest weakness.
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