Iron sharpens iron, and that is most certainly the case during training camp at Saint Vincent College in Latrobe, especially when the pads come on for the Pittsburgh Steelers.
On Tuesday, the pads came on and the hitting started quickly as head coach Mike Tomlin and the Steelers dove right into the competitive periods of practice with Seven Shots and the attention-heavy backs-on-‘backers drills.
For third-year running back Jaylen Warren, the competition periods are intense and can get heated, but that’s where the team comes together and camaraderie is built.
“Yeah, there’s a lot of competition that comes with it, but that’s what helps us build as [a] team,” Warren said to reporters, according to video via the Post-Gazette on YouTube. “Everything that comes with it brings us together.”
Those sessions can get heated as the intensity is ramped up, players are hitting for the first time ahead of the season, and there is pride on the line.
As Steelers Depot’s Alex Kozora notes from practice in Latrobe, the running backs led by Najee Harris had a good day in backs-on-‘backers. Harris has had some issues in the past in pass protection, but he took a step forward in this area of his game last season and was also quite vocal in the drill, according to ESPN’s Brooke Pryor.
The talk coming out of the backs-on-‘backers drill thought was the competition between Warren and rookie linebacker Payton Wilson.
As Kozora noted, there was a big pop between the two in the drill to close things out. Iron sharpening iron, indeed.
After practice, Warren was asked about the rookie linebacker.
“He’s aggressive. He wants to get better,” Warren said of Wilson. “He always wants to learn and up his game. And I know he’s like that kind of person.”
Going against one of the top pass-protecting running backs in Warren is a good way to learn for the rookie linebacker.
So far, Wilson is off to a fast start in training camp, earning praise from teammates and his head coach. Tuesday’s battle with Warren in backs-on-‘backers was an eye-opener for the rookie, but in the end was a good way to build things as a team, especially in a heated practice setting.
