The Pittsburgh Steelers are an organization with a convenient name for sports cliches. It sounds better to talk about iron sharpening iron when your name involves metalworking. It’s probably just a smidge less potent for, say, the Dolphins or the Browns. It just works. It gives off that hardworking yet chippy persona that resonates with the identity the Steelers have forged for 90 years.
And it’s one that thrives on young blood with an edge. They have that in guys like WR George Pickens and rookie CB Joey Porter Jr., a pair of recent second-round picks who should see quite a lot of each other for the next several years, or one would hope.
The rookie got a little taste of the physical streak that Pickens is capable of bringing to the position yesterday. You probably read about it or saw the video by now, but it’s only a tiny piece of the story. The wide receiver caught Porter off-balance on a backpedal during 7-on-7 work and put him on his butt, as he did to so many cornerbacks in Georgia and even as a rookie in the NFL last season. And yes, Pickens got the ball.
Head coach Mike Tomlin was asked about what he expressed to the players after the ‘incident’, such as it was (Porter reportedly had his chain broken or something, which, again, isn’t the important part). “I’ll leave that between us”, he told reporters. “Just part of team development. Everything is not for public consumption”.
And once again I have to thank Tomlin for his use of colorful language, characterizing his messaging to his young budding starters as “not for public consumption”, because in other contexts it conveys a sense of violence, like an MPA rating “unsuitable for children”.
That’s how Steelers fans want their team to play—not literally, but you understand the point. That’s how the coaches want them to play. That’s how the players want to play, for that matter. And guys like Pickens and Porter are going to bring that edge, that physicality, that toughness that isn’t always present at such positions.
Mike DeFabo of The Athletic noted that Porter didn’t take it lying down—at least after he got his butt off the ground. He Tweeted (or Xcreted, or whatever we’re calling posts on X now) that Porter chirped at Pickens at the end of practice, telling him, “I got something for you”.
Make no mistake, this is all a good thing. Let these young guys challenge each other, be physical, be competitive. As long as it remains productive and conducive to the betterment of the group, I’m all for it—provided that it’s also within the rules, of course.
So let’s not make this about the play itself. This is about what it means in a broader, even symbolic sense. Pickens and Porter are players expected to be building blocks, hopefully for the next decade or more. They’re setting the tone for what they are going to bring to the table and how they will shape the identity of this team moving into the next era. And perhaps some of it won’t be for public consumption, so to speak, but it should benefit what we do see in stadiums.
