Player: T Troy Fautanu
Stock Value: Up
Reasoning: The Steelers appear to have begun the promotion process for rookie T Troy Fautanu. Beginning on Tuesday, he is seeing more first-team work, seeing quite a bit of reps there. A first-round pick, he is destined for the starting lineup, but the exact timeline is less clear. He could be the starter by next week if he plays well in the first preseason game.
Nobody actually thinks that Troy Fautanu isn’t going to start at some point this season. The question was never an if from the very beginning, but rather a when. Still, after Broderick Jones sat for the first half of his rookie season, it wasn’t obvious that the when would be right away.
Those who want him in the lineup sooner rather than later, however, have some ammunition for their hopes. The Steelers began incorporating Fautanu into the first-team lineup with this week’s practice, surely with more to come.
For the first couple weeks and throughout OTAs, Fautanu worked almost exclusively with the second team. Broderick Jones was playing right tackle while Dan Moore Jr. remained entrenched at left, but Jones moved to the left side with Fautanu playing first-team snaps.
That is the lineup the Steelers want. After all, they drafted Jones and Fautanu in the first round over the past two years. They drafted these guys where they did, anticipating they would be foundational pieces for their offense.
But Troy Fautanu’s first major test is not in training camp; rather, it is in the preseason. He has spent the past couple of months smacking around his teammates, but now he has to hit someone else. He is looking forward to that challenge, but he has to live up to it first.
The expectation, of course, is that he will because he has been on a consistently upward trajectory. He came out of college as a pretty polished, technical player, and he has the physical attributes to succeed. Nothing indicates that he lacks anything in his mental makeup, either. At this rate, it seems very likely he will be the starter at right tackle for the opener, barring injury.
As the season progresses, Steelers players’ stocks rise and fall. The nature of the evaluation differs with the time of year, with in-season considerations being more often short-term. Considerations in the offseason often have broader implications, particularly when players lose their jobs, or the team signs someone. This time of year is full of transactions, whether minor or major.
A bad game, a new contract, an injury, a promotion—any number of things affect a player’s value. Think of it as a stock on the market, based on speculation. You’ll feel better about a player after a good game, or worse after a bad one. Some stock updates are minor, while others are likely to be quite drastic, so bear in mind the degree. I’ll do my best to explain the nature of that in the reasoning section of each column.
