During a three-game losing streak toward the end of the 2023 season, there was a barrage of media narratives criticizing the Pittsburgh Steelers’ leadership and the fading of the “Steeler Way” tradition that has been with the team for the last half century. A lot of the issues were on the offensive side of the ball, as it was one of the youngest offenses in the league. The defense still has plenty of cornerstone pieces that have been around for a while and walk the walk of being a leader. Minkah Fitzpatrick was interviewed a few weeks ago by CBN Sports and talked about his leadership role with the Steelers.
“Pittsburgh itself is a blue collar, hard-working, family-oriented city. The Steelers reflect that as well in the way that we play, in the way that the organization is run,” Fitzpatrick said in a video of the interview posted on YouTube. “That’s how I am as a man and as a player. I come from a blue-collar family, family centered. Pittsburgh was a perfect fit. God definitely made it happen for a reason.”
Fitzpatrick was acquired via trade in 2019, and quickly turned into one of the best safeties in the NFL. He has earned three first-team All-Pro selections and four Pro Bowl selections since joining the team. His play on the field has been excellent and steady, and his role as a leader has been evolving as he matures and grows as a person off the field.
“His leadership is more of a walk than talk,” Heyward said in a clip from the same video.
Not every leader needs to be outspoken to be effective. It is just as important to have guys who are exemplary leaders. The type of player whose play on the field can’t be ignored that others try to emulate in their preparation and approach to the game. But in 2023 Fitzpatrick started to find his voice as a leader.
His evolving leadership came in part because of the trials of the 2023 season. Fitzpatrick had never dealt with missing seven games with injury before, and that forced him to step up in other ways as he couldn’t lead by example as easily.
In a separate interview a couple months ago with team chaplain Kent Chevalier via Sports Spectrum, he talked about Fitzpatrick’s evolution.
“He started leading differently,” said Chevalier. “He even said…’I used to be a man that would just lead by example,’ and now he is leading by example and [with] his words.”
Players like Fitzpatrick, Heyward, T.J. Watt, and others are why this team was ultimately able to stay together and dig its way out of an uncomfortable position at the end of the 2023 season. While the media was busy criticizing the team leadership, the reality was much different behind closed doors.
Fitzpatrick now sees it as one of his main responsibilities to pass the tradition of leadership down to the next generation of Steelers players.
“Great leaders create great leaders,” Fitzpatrick said. “Coach [Nick] Saban in college was great at that. Coach T. is great at that. They’re winning coaches for a reason because they hold people to a high standard, whether they like it or not. All of us become better men and the better man you are, I believe the better player you’ll be.”
The defense was the oldest in the NFL last year, and it won’t be too many years before some of the foundational players start to hang up their cleats. Fitzpatrick knows it is his shared responsibility to foster the growth of other leaders in the locker room for the next era in Pittsburgh.
