With the Pittsburgh Steelers’ 2023 season at an end following a bitter loss to the Buffalo Bills in the Wild-Card Round, it’s time to look to the future already. There will be plenty to wrap up over the next several months as players come and go, including re-signings, releases, draft picks, perhaps trades, and who knows what else.
We will also inevitably take stock of who had good seasons, who had bad seasons, who improved their position, who hurt theirs. In case you haven’t noticed, the NFL has long turned itself into a 365-day business (366 during leap years), so we’ll always have something to discuss.
Player: T Broderick Jones
Stock Value: Down
Reasoning: The first-round rookie had one of the worst games of his very young career in his first postseason start against the Buffalo Bills. He did not fare well either as a run blocker or as a pass protector, but the latter was certainly worse. This stock evaluation exclusively reflects his performance in the postseason game and does not take into account the entirety of the season. A season-long evaluation will follow later.
If head coach Mike Tomlin needs a nudge to relieve him from his “undecided” state concerning Broderick Jones’ positional future, he may be wise to carefully review the Buffalo Bills game. The rookie first-round pick probably looked his most uncomfortable as a professional, struggling with Buffalo’s defensive line both in the run game and in pass protection.
Not only did he allow the game’s only sack for the Steelers, he had a hard time maintaining leverage in the run-blocking department though this wasn’t quite the sore spot as pass protection, but it has to make you wonder about his future.
Not about how well he can play but about where he’s best suited. While he won’t downplay his position flexibility, there is a high probability that left tackle is his best position. Tomlin might not say it in January, but I would be surprised if Jones isn’t moved to left tackle for 2024. Even he admitted it would be “ideal” to move back there.
That being said, Jones did have several good games at right tackle, with the first game against Cincinnati and against New England sticking out in my memory. I might argue that his play declined over the course of the year, if anything. Not in a clear linear trajectory but more generally.
The manner in which Greg Rousseau beat him with an inside move is something that developed into a pattern, for example, and I wouldn’t be surprised if that has something to do with the mechanics of switching from his more natural left side to the right side.
Still, we also have to acknowledge that this was an in-season move. He got very little work at all at right tackle before the coaches decided to put him in the lineup there. Perhaps with a full offseason it would look smoother—one would imagine as much—but would it ever look as good as he could look at left tackle?
