With OTAs wrapping up and the team transitioning to mandatory minicamp next week, the Pittsburgh Steelers seem to be hitting their stride when it comes to players recovering from previous injuries.
Earlier this week, WR Allen Robinson II mentioned that he was practicing fully for the first time since suffering a foot injury last season. DL Larry Ogunjobi appears to be fully back from a foot injury that hampered him for most of the 2022 season.
Also dealing with a foot injury from last season is second-year WR Calvin Austin III, who never played a preseason snap for the Steelers last year, going down several practices into training camp with a foot injury that required season-ending surgery.
News has been coming out of OTAs that Austin had been participating heavily in practice and was looking like the same fast, explosive receiver we saw glimpses of in training camp last season. While speaking to the media Thursday after practice, TE Connor Heyward talked about his relationship with Austin and WR George Pickens. He specifically mentioned that Austin looks ready to go once training camp gets underway in Latrobe.
“George [Pickens], Calvin [Austin] and I… we’re extremely close… extremely comfortable with the offense” Heyward said via video from the Steelers’ YouTube channel. “Obviously, George had a lot of playing time last year. I played a little bit and then Calvin being hurt, but Calvin was still in all the meetings last year and he looks a hundred percent to me. I don’t know if he’s a hundred percent, but he is out there. He’s doing everything, looks a hundred percent. And even if it’s 90 percent, he’s probably still running 4.3. I mean, he’s lightning fast and just having his presence out there can really have the defense word because he can take the top off at any moment.”
Austin was drafted in the fourth round of the 2022 NFL Draft, two rounds after Pittsburgh selected Pickens. The team double-dipped at WR to add a pass catcher in Austin who brings a new element to the receiver corps. He is a speedster who can create YAC as well as challenge defenses vertically down the field thanks to his 4.32 speed.
Pittsburgh has plenty of talented receivers in the room with Pickens, Diontae Johnson, and Allen Robinson II, but none have the skill set that Austin brings to the table tanks to his game-changing speed and burst. Having him factor into the offense will be a huge benefit to the Steelers, helping them open up their passing game in terms of creating run-after-catch opportunities as well as singling up Austin on a safety or linebacker in the slot and try and have them keep up with him as he stretches the seam as a deep threat.
It remains to be seen if Austin opens up training camp on the PUP list, but based on what’s been coming out of OTAs thus far, Austin looks ready to hit the ground running in 2023.
