You want to talk about NFL Comeback Player of the Year? Cam Heyward should garner serious consideration. After a groin tear in the regular-season opener a year ago, many questioned if Heyward’s career was winding down. The Steelers signing him to a contract extension this summer produced outrage.
In response, all Heyward has done is have another stellar season. One of football’s best interior linemen if not the best this season. Only New York Giants NT Dexter Lawrence and Kansas City Chiefs DT Chris Jones could be in that argument. Heyward added two more sacks in the Steelers’ 27-14 win over the Cleveland Browns Sunday, giving him eight on the season.
At this point, everyone knows how good Heyward has been. There’s no need to state the obvious. But good or great or fantastic don’t adequately capture what Heyward is doing in his age-35 season. What’s happening is downright historic.
I touched on it in today’s Stats of the Weird and it’s worth re-telling here. Heyward’s eight sacks at age 35 are the most by a Steelers player his age in official NFL history, 1982 to today. Only the great Ernie Stautner, one of three Steelers to have his jersey retired, has unofficially done the same, recording eight at age 37 in 1962.
And since 1982, Cam Heyward is one of two true defensive tackles, interior rushers, to have eight or more sacks at age 35-plus. Chicago Bears DT and Hall of Famer Steve McMichael is the other, notching 10.5 in his age-35 season in 1992. Heyward could set the record.
History says what Heyward is doing shouldn’t be possible. Defensive ends can succeed, and the great ones can even thrive late in their career. Reggie White posted 16 sacks at age 37. Bruce Smith had 46 from age 35 to age 40, including a pair of double-digit campaigns. Julius Peppers had 11 when he was 37. Those guys just keep going and going, slowly rolling downhill to a graceful exit.
Defensive tackles? They fall off cliffs. Sharp drops to career ends. Warren Sapp had 10 sacks at age 34. He had two as a 35-year-old and retired. John Randle steadily fell from 11 when he was 34 to 7 at 35 to 5 at 36. La’Roi Glover, a forgotten six-time Pro Bowler, had six at age 34 and a half-sack the next year, hanging up his cleats immediately after. Similar played out for Ndamukong Suh. Still going strong at 34 with six sacks. At 35? Just one of them and his career wrapped up.
Cam Heyward isn’t regressing. He’s not even plateauing. He might be getting better. It defies the odds. Maybe it’s the chip on his shoulder, fueled by every snub and doubt he can find, but Heyward is on track to finish with 10.5 sacks, which would tie for the second-best mark of his career (and tie McMichael’s record). With his ability to pick them up in bunches — Heyward notched his second multi-sack game of the season yesterday — he could easily surpass that and threaten his career-best of 12 set in 2017.
If Heyward can reach 10 sacks, he’ll become just the 14th player in official history, no matter the position, to hit double-digits at age 35 or older. The others? Kevin Greene, Chris Doleman, Julius Peppers, Bruce Smith, Reggie White, Terrell Suggs, Cam Wake, John Abraham, Trace Armstrong, Rickey Jackson, Steve McMichael, and Ed ‘Too Tall’ Jones. What a list to join.
Perhaps the Steelers slow playing the start of his career is making an impact. Heyward was drafted in 2011 when rookies sat and learned, especially in Pittsburgh. Drafted as the future, not the present, he sat behind Aaron Smith and Brett Keisel before starting in his third season. That’s given him fresher tires for the later stages of his career. Still, Heyward comes with lots of mileage, 207 games and 172 starts, and there should have been a decline in his game. Especially knowing the injury he came off last year that would tank a lesser player down into the twilight of his career.
Pittsburgh’s smartly reduced his snap count this season, down about 10 percent compared to recent years and nearly a 20-percent reduction from the peak early in his career. In 2014 and 2014, he rarely left the field with 87- and 88-percent snap count rates. Entering Sunday, he sat at 71 percent. Heyward sits out most practices, often getting Wednesday and Thursday off before getting the green light Friday. That has helped take care of his body to make him effective late-game and late in the season. And what Heyward’s done puts him in a very small club and eclipsing what many greats before him failed to sustain.
Father Time is undefeated. That’s the saying. Eventually, it’ll come true for Cam Heyward. But Heyward is taking him into the late rounds, putting him on the ropes, and wearing him out. Call his season what it is. It’s a great one. But even that undersells the historic nature of his 2024 campaign.
