MOBILE, Alabama—Every draft class has its own flavor. Some classes are top heavy, while others are deep. Some have great quarterbacks, while others have great prospects in the trenches. The 2025 NFL Draft appears to be a deep class, and particularly strong at two positions: defensive line and running back. That works out pretty well for the Pittsburgh Steelers.
The 2025 Senior Bowl should be a great showcase for many of the top names at both of those positions.
“If you look at the d-line group alone…there’s a lot of potential first-round guys,” Senior Bowl director Jim Nagy said during his introductory press conference for the event. “The two positions of strength I think in the draft and really on these [Senior Bowl] rosters are running back and defensive line. I think those are unusually strong groups.”
This is quite the opposite from last year. They struggled to get eight draftable running backs in Mobile last year, and this year they were able to easily round up 12 of them.
Just how stacked is this running back class? Nagy was asked about the possibility of there being 30 draftable running backs in the 2025 class.
“Yeah, that’s probably the number it was for us,” Nagy agreed. “For teams that need one, it’s a good thing because the free agent class isn’t great.”
The running backs come in all different shapes and sizes. Do you want a massive back who can do it all? Ollie Gordon II is your guy. Do you want a speedster who can get the edge and be a big part of your receiving game? RJ Harvey or Bhayshul Tuten fit that description.
One draft analyst thinks there is going to be a “running back bonanza” on Day 2 of the draft. With the depth, there’s no need to reach in the first round. You can get an impact player well into the fourth round and a role player probably all the way through the seventh.
“It’s a great group, it’s dynamic,” Nagy said. “It’s a really diverse skill-set group.”
It’s also a huge flipping of the script for the defensive line group in this year’s draft. There were only three or four 5-tech prospects last year who made any sense for the Steelers to target with their very specific set of criteria they tend to look for at the position. The Senior Bowl alone should have at least four or five prospects who could fit in that role.
With Cameron Heyward aging and Larry Ogunjobi likely on his way out, the importance of adding to the defensive line group can’t be stressed enough. The rest of the defense doesn’t matter if you can’t stop the run or get pressure on the quarterback.
The depth at these two positions should enable the Steelers to have a number of different approaches. They aren’t locked into having to take one of these players in the first round because they should be able to get a difference maker on Day 2 of the 2025 NFL Draft.
