Out of all the Pittsburgh Steelers’ rookie draft picks, no player has a better chance to be the Week 1 starter than C Zach Frazier. After releasing Mason Cole prior to free agency, one of the biggest needs on the roster was at center, and they filled that need with the No. 51 pick in the second round of the 2024 NFL Draft.
Mike Tomlin has traditionally been thoughtful with how he brings rookies along, even if they are high draft picks. We saw that a year ago with Broderick Jones waiting until Week 9 to become the full-time starter. Frazier enters the league with significantly more college starting experience than Jones did, and he will still need to compete for the starting job with veteran OL Nate Herbig. Isaac Seumalo told the Steelers media that Herbig should not be counted out in that competition, but he has just 49 snaps of NFL center experience.
Frazier might have the inside track, but he still has a significant learning curve ahead of him to get used to the speed of the game and the sophistication of NFL defenses.
“I think it’s gonna be a big deal,” said former Steelers OL Craig Wolfley on Draft Nation when asked about Frazier’s adjustment to the pro level. “He’s gonna be couched in between two guys, Seumalo and [James] Daniels, that are veteran guys, alright. That’s gonna be a big help, no doubt about it. But in the college game, so much of what you do is when the defense lines up, that’s pretty much what you got. When you get to the pros, you’ve got people like Troy Polamalu in years past out there trying to sugar the coverage…He’s kind of hanging around trying to disguise what they’re gonna do.”
Because the center is located at the middle of the offense, they are typically tasked with making calls at the line and making sure the guards and tackles are on the same page. Defensive coordinators aren’t going to make that easy for a rookie center with disguised blitzes and other intricacies that aren’t as common at the college level. Thankfully, Frazier is surrounded by veteran guards. Seumalo in particular has been referred to as one of the smartest players in the league and should be a big help while Zach Frazier gets acclimated.
The mental aspect will take some time to adjust to, but how will he hold up on the physical side of things?
“He’s gonna be just fine, I think, given enough time to work at it. The other thing is Zach’s got that goofy wrestler strength,” Wolfley said. “By that, what I mean is this guy is 360 degrees strong. Goofy wrestler strength are guys that have the ability in whatever posture, whatever plane of motion, whatever position they’re in. They’re able to be strong in that because of all the off balancing and strength work they do in all these various postures.”
When it comes to leverage, body control, and functional strength, you aren’t going to get much better than a former state wrestling champ who went 159-2 in his career.
He is going to get a lot of practice reps against another young player like Keeanu Benton, who has already displayed a rare blend of power and burst to provide an example of the athletes Frazier will face on a week-to-week basis.
The learning curve from the college to the professional level is unavoidable, but Zach Frazier has the experience, “goofy wrestler strength,” and veteran help next to him to make it work.
