Over the course of three seasons in Tuscaloosa from 2015-17, Pittsburgh Steelers star safety Minkah Fitzpatrick and Jacksonville Jaguars wide receiver Calvin Ridley were stars on either side of the football for the Alabama Crimson Tide under head coach Nick Saban.
During that time, the duo helped Alabama win national championships in 2015 and 2017 and both went on to become first-round picks in the 2018 NFL Draft, though neither is with the team that drafted them that year.
On Sunday at Acrisure Stadium, the two former Crimson Tide stars will get reacquainted with each other after going against each other in practice daily in Tuscaloosa with Saban keeping a close watch. That familiarity from Ridley’s vantage point regarding Fitzpatrick has the veteran Jaguars wide receiver cautioning the rest of Jacksonville’s offense when it comes to Fitzpatrick’s game-changing abilities.
“You gotta always know where he at. He’s a ballhawk,” Ridley said to reporters Wednesday, according to video via Jaguars.com. “He’s gonna find the ball, he’s gonna fly around. Smart, physical, just an all-around great player.”
Throughout his career with the Steelers after being acquired in a September 2019 trade with the Miami Dolphins, Fitzpatrick has been the best safety in the league, taking the football away at an impressive rate, solidifying the Steelers’ secondary in the process.
He has three first-team All-Pro accolades for a reason.
Though he’s a player that the Jaguars must account for on every play in Week Eight, Fitzpatrick has yet to force a turnover this season as the Steelers continue to deploy him defensively in a number of different ways. According to Pro Football Focus, Fitzpatrick has played 169 snaps as a true free safety, 115 snaps in the slot, 84 snaps in the box, 16 snaps as a corner and 11 snaps lined up along the defensive line.
His versatility has helped the Steelers cover up some things defensively, but it’s hindered his ability to make plays on the football. He leads the Steelers in tackles with 52 and is on pace for a career-high 147 tackles. He has just one pass breakup on the season, but has allowed just 14 receptions for 166 yards 22 targets this season, good for just 11.9 yards per reception.
Despite the lack of big plays, Fitzpatrick isn’t fretting when it comes to the interceptions, the fumble recoveries and more that the Steelers and the fan base have been accustomed to seeing from him in his first five seasons with the franchise.
Last week after returning from the Week Six bye week, Fitzpatrick stated that the big plays would come, and that it’s not as though he’s missing the opportunity to make plays. The football will eventually find him, and when it does, he’ll make the plays. That’s what he’s always done.
However, as Steelers Depot’s own Matthew Marczi pointed out heading into the matchup against the Los Angeles Rams in Week Seven, Fitzpatrick is facing his highest volume of targets in his career, per Pro Football Reference, averaging just 9.3 snaps in coverage per target, among the 10 highest rates of targets for safeties in the league this season. That number was 31.7 back in 2020, and 14.8 last year.
So, teams are throwing at him more, based on the numbers, but the real opportunities for game-changing plays haven’t quite presented themselves yet.
It will happen, but thus far this is 2021 all over again for Fitzpatrick. That year, he had to play around the line of scrimmage more to help as the Steelers finished with one of the worst run defenses in the league. So far this season, Pittsburgh is struggling to stop the run, calling on Fitzpatrick to make more plays in the run game than as that high-level pass defender.
Regardless of where he aligns on Sunday though, Ridley and the Jaguars have to know where he is. He can change games in the blink of an eye. Sunday would be a great time for his first takeaway of the season.
