PITTSBURGH — The Steelers took wide receiver Chase Claypool from Notre Dame with the 49th pick in the NFL draft, a bit of a surprise because Claypool wasn’t one of the players discussed at length as a Steelers possibility before the draft.
Local pundits and fans didn’t know a whole lot about Claypool when he was selected. It didn’t matter, though, because his selection was met with a whole lot of this sentiment:
“I don’t know much about him, but when it comes to drafting receivers, you have to trust the Steelers.”
Yes, there have been a lot of great receivers who have played for the Steelers over the years. But that isn’t relevant now. The discussion prompted me to take a look at this history, and I’m not sure why there is so much blind faith in the ability of the current front office and coaching staff to pick receivers.
Don’t get me wrong, this has nothing to do with Claypool. Only time will tell whether or not he was a good selection, and by all accounts he has the tools to be a star. It could be a great pick. But the idea that we are supposed to accept that he is going to turn out to be a star simply because he was evaluated as such by the Steelers is where I draw the line.
— The 2007 draft was the first one the Steelers had after Mike Tomlin was hired. That year they drafted one receiver, Dallas Baker, a seventh-round selection. He had an NFL career of eight games and one reception for 6 yards.
— The Steelers used their second-round pick in 2008 to select Limas Sweed out of Texas. He played in 20 NFL games and had seven receptions for 69 yards. He is a receiver who had all the physical tools and one fatal flaw — he couldn’t catch.
— In 2009 the Steelers hit a home run with Mike Wallace in the third round. And then 2010 is the year they are still living off in terms of their reputation for drafting receivers as they took Emanuel Sanders in the third round and Antonio Brown in the sixth.
— They followed that up with two misses and a very average player in Toney Clemons in 2012 (seventh round, three career receptions), Markus Wheaton (third round, 110 receptions over 59 games) and Justin Brown (sixth round, eight games, 12 receptions).
— In 2014 they drafted Dri Archer in the third round (20 career games, seven receptions) and Martavis Bryant in the fourth (44 games, 145 receptions). Some would argue that Bryant was a good pick, but he wasn’t. He never came close to reaching his potential, he had drug problems, was suspended a few times and smoked his way out of the league. He had eight TD receptions his first year, six his second and three in his final season.
— The 2015 draft brought us another tall, fast athlete who couldn’t catch in Sammie Coates (third round, 45 career games, 29 career receptions). And in 2016 they went the opposite way and grabbed a smaller, quicker receiver with seventh-round pick Demarcus Ayers (two games, six receptions).
That’s a vast wasteland of bad picks or players who were extremely underwhelming. They appear to have redeemed themselves in 2017 with second-round pick JuJu Smith-Schuster, though he is coming off a bad year. It also appears 2018 second-round pick James Washington and 2019 third-pick Diontae Johnson may work out, but the book is still incomplete on them.
The Steelers under Tomlin and GM Kevin Colbert drafted 15 receivers before this year, and nine of them have been mostly busts. They have hit on four of them — Wallace, Sanders, Brown and Smith-Schuster — and the jury is still out on Washington and Johnson.
We can quibble about Wheaton or Bryant, but regardless, that’s not a resume that suggests the Steelers evaluation of receivers shouldn’t be questioned at all. And interestingly enough, many of the biggest busts fit into the category of “tall, fast guys who will stretch the field with their speed.”
Sound familiar? Let’s hope not. And let’s hope that Claypool is as advertised. I think he’s a good football player who has some excellent skills, but that’s on his merit and the eye test alone, not because the Steelers have some magical infallible formula for drafting receivers.
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