Paul Zeise: Steelers need their last 3 1st-round picks to shine this year

Paul Zeise, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette on Aug 20, 2025

Published in Football

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PITTSBURGH — All reports out of Steelers training camp are first-round pick Derrick Harmon is fitting in nicely and proving he has the chops to be an impact player in his first season in the NFL.

Harmon is mostly a run-stopping defensive lineman and when he was drafted by the Steelers, he was called by a number of observers and experts a “plug-and-play” option who should immediately jump into the starting lineup.

That is always the goal with a first-round pick but isn’t always the case, but it sure seems like it will be with Harmon. He is a starter and pretty much has been since the first day of rookie minicamp, and I don’t think we have seen anything to indicate he won’t be next month when the season opens up.

And more importantly, we haven’t seen anything that indicates he shouldn’t be the starter, as he has been consistently consistent, if not very good at times, at the things he will be asked to do. The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette’s Christopher Carter did a thorough breakdown of Harmon’s night versus Tampa Bay on Saturday, and he showed a number of plays in which he was an impact player.

Harmon’s role will primarily be as a run stopper, and that is an area in which the Steelers needed help last year. His presence will also free up Cam Heyward, as Harmon will take on double-team blocks and he should also help keep the inside linebackers clean and able to make plays.

Eventually the hope is Harmon will also become a presence as a pass rusher, but if all he does is stop the run at a consistently high level, he will earn his keep and justify his status as a first-round pick. Harmon was picked specifically to do a job, and so far, it looks like he is going to be very good at it.

That’s what you want from your first-round picks, and that is why this is such an important development. And the thing is if Harmon isn’t good, there really isn’t another good option to fill his role, so not only are the Steelers hoping Harmon is who they thought he was when they drafted him, they need him to be that, as well.

But Harmon isn’t the only first-round pick the Steelers absolutely need to be good this season. In fact, the Steelers need their first-round picks from 2023 and 2024 to be really good this year, as well.

And much like the case with Harmon, if either or both aren’t, there isn’t a viable alternative, so the Steelers’ hopes of putting it all together this year will be sunk.

That’s especially true considering their first-round picks from 2018, 2019, 2021 and 2022 are no longer on the team and they didn’t have a first-rounder in 2020 but used their first pick (a second-round selection) on Chase Claypool, who is somewhere in pro football purgatory. Heck, that in and of itself is probably worthy of a conversation about the team’s lack of playoff success recently, but that’s for a different day.

In fact, the only two other first-rounders from the last 15 years still on the roster are from 2011 (Cam Heyward) and 2017 (T.J. Watt). Watt and Heyward obviously have more than accounted for themselves, but the Steelers have not gotten nearly enough bang for their first-round buck in recent years.

And that brings me to the 2023 first-rounder tackle Broderick Jones and his bookend Troy Fautanu, who was the first-round pick of the Steelers in 2024.

Jones has to develop and take that next step as a really productive player and he has to be the solution at left tackle. The offensive line actually really depends on it, mostly because there isn’t anyone else behind him on the depth chart good enough to be a legitimate option on a team with playoff aspirations.

He has shown some flashes — and he did even last year when he was a right tackle. But he was not consistent enough on any level, and while there is some sentiment that now that he is a left tackle, his natural position, it will all fall into place, I need to see it before I believe it.

Fautanu is just a complete unknown, as he is basically a rookie, even though he was on the team last year. He showed in his brief time before he got injured that he has some raw natural talent, but now he needs to prove he can do it on a weekly basis. I have seen some good things from him so far, but again, we won’t know until the lights come on in the regular season.

The first-round picks are supposed to be, theoretically, the best players on the team or — at the very least — productive players who impact the game. The Steelers have two who fit that profile in Heyward and Watt, but now they need their last three picks, especially the two offensive tackles, to do the same if they really want to end their playoff drought.

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