Every year ahead of the annual scouting combine it’s always fun to hear Pittsburgh Steelers general manager Kevin Colbert detail each position group as to the depth of talent each one has. On Wednesday, Colbert talked a little about the inside and outside linebacker depth of this year’s draft class in addition to talking about the 2018 quarterback group in a few different interviews. As it turned out, Colbert also recapped every position on Wednesday during an interview with Missi Matthews and Bob Labriola of steelers.com.
“You can go right through it. The running backs are strong, the quarterbacks are strong, which is great for the league,” Colbert said Wednesday. “Wide receivers, there’s a high number of wide receivers. I can’t say there’s a bunch of impact wideouts. Tight ends, the numbers are down. The interior offensive line are down. As usual, the tackles are good.”
Colbert then moved on to talk about the defensive side of the football.
“Safeties are good,” Colbert said. “Corners, there’s an exceeding, like the receivers, I can’t say there’s a ton of great impact guys, but there’s a lot of numbers. Outside linebacker-types are good. Inside [linebackers], not so much. There’s a few impactful guys, but then there’s a lot of numbers. And inside guys usually have one ability that maybe they can cover, they can play the run or maybe they’re special teams guys. There’s a nice group of those. Defensive line, it’s more outside than inside.”
There you go and what Colbert said about the outside and inside linebacker groups is consistent with what he said in other interviews.
Is Colbert smoke-screening? I don’t think he is and Alex Kozora sort of detailed as to why we should believe that these are Colbert’s true opinions about this year’s draft class.
The Steelers are expected to have a defensive-heavy draft again this year and that shouldn’t come as a big surprise. In fact, we could see the team draft three defensive players with their first three selections just as they did in 2016. We can probably expect them to select another wide receiver at some point during this years draft and potentially even another running back in the later rounds.
