Since exiting the season opener with a groin injury, Pittsburgh Steelers DL Cameron Heyward has spent most of his time watching his teammates from the sideline. Not quite all of it, however. He spent the second half of the Cleveland Browns game in the locker room—and didn’t like it, especially the announcing. So he was back out there on Sunday.
And he was Coach Cam, or at least even more so than he normally is, an extra set of eyes for his teammates out there. Usually, he serves that leadership role right in the trenches as an active communicator, but he’s trying to use his sideline perspective now to help as well.
“Just reaffirming what we’ve talked about all throughout the week. [Communicating] what I see from the sideline, and just being there when they need me the most”, Heyward explained on the NBC postgame show after Sunday’s win about what exactly he is trying to so when he is watching.
The last two games, at least from a pass-rush perspective, have been pretty exciting to watch. Though he was evidently in the locker room for Alex Highsmith’s critical strip sack that T.J. Watt returned for a touchdown against the Browns, he got to see the first career sacks of DeMarvin Leal and Keeanu Benton in consecutive weeks.
It wasn’t guaranteed that he would be out on the sideline so early though. A week ago on his Not Just Football podcast recapping the Cleveland win, he pointed out that not everybody was necessarily thrilled with him being there at the time.
“I got clearance from the doctors, but there were some other people who didn’t want me on the sideline just because they thought it was early”, he pointed out. “Head coach, trainer, you name it, they didn’t want me on the sideline”.
Heyward is expected to miss roughly two months due to this injury, which is the second major issue he has had since entering the NFL. He missed more than half of 2016 as well, with the final, season-ending injury being a torn pectoral.
This injury, for which he reportedly had sports hernia surgery, should not keep him on the shelf for the remainder of the season, but he may have to work his way back in slowly. Off the top of my head, the last Steelers defender to deal with a sports hernia injury of this magnitude was Bud Dupree back in 2016. He spent 10 weeks on the Reserve/Injured List. That injury occurred in early August.
Now 34 years old, Heyward is at the age when a defensive lineman’s body can start going downhill in a hurry. He is coming off some of the best years of his entire career, however, posting 20.5 sacks over the past two seasons with 163 tackles, 29 tackles for loss, 40 quarterback hits, 13 passes defensed, and an interception.
That’s a little bit more than coaching, but that’s all he can do right now. At least so far, it’s been enough.
