When the Pittsburgh Steelers drafted OT Troy Fautanu 20th overall, the initial reactions were almost universally positive. A lot of people figured he wouldn’t even be there for the Steelers to consider. The Steelers may have even let it slip during head coach Mike Tomlin’s call to Fautanu that he was ranked seventh out of 20 prospects on their big board.
Shortly after that initial giddy feeling, a question likely cropped up: Where would Fautanu play? The Steelers aren’t even considering him at guard like a number of other teams. However, there is still the question of left tackle versus right tackle. Ray Fittipaldo of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette held his weekly Steelers chat on Tuesday, and one reader asked him about how he sees the tackle situation shaping up.
“I think they’ll take a look at Fautanu on the right side this spring,” Fittipaldo wrote. “And then make a decision by the time they get to training camp.”
Steelers general manager Omar Khan has already stated that the team’s preference is for OT Broderick Jones to slot back to his natural left tackle position at some point. That’s where Jones played his college career. He did start more than half his rookie season at right tackle, though.
The quandary is that Fautanu played left tackle in college, too. Fautanu has the footwork and muscle memory of playing left tackle and would need to relearn everything to play right tackle. That’s probably a big reason why Brian Baldinger thinks the Steelers should keep Fautanu at left tackle. At least Jones has more experience playing right tackle than Fautanu in a game setting at this point. Fautanu played just two snaps at right tackle in college, though he says he was cross-trained in practice.
One big difference is that while Jones would be used to protecting a right-handed quarterback’s blindside, Fautanu isn’t. He played left tackle, protecting QB Michael Penix Jr., who is left-handed. So if there were blocking issues, Penix would have seen it and been able to react quicker than issues with his right tackle. Neither Russell Wilson nor Justin Fields are left-handed, so the left tackle is protecting their blindside.
It sounds like Fittipaldo is expecting the Steelers to evaluate how well Fautanu can adapt to playing right tackle. If that’s indeed the case, it sounds like they envision Jones at left tackle and Fautanu at right. However, we can also expect that if Fautanu struggles with the switch, they will likely play him at left since Jones has the experience at right tackle.
How the Steelers handle the offensive tackle situation will be fascinating. There’s also Dan Moore Jr., last year’s starting left tackle, to remember. While he had a terrible year, he’s still on the team, and the Steelers kept starting him last season.
Ultimately, this is a good problem to have with two talented first-round tackles. The rest will work itself out in practice and training camp.
