The Pittsburgh Steelers first reported free agent agreement of 2025 comes as a bit of a surprise, former Baltimore Ravens ILB Malik Harrison poised to sign a two-year, $10 million deal. Presumably, he’ll replace Elandon Roberts who is off to Las Vegas to sign with the Raiders.
Are the Steelers getting a 1:1 replacement? Something better, something worse? Let’s dive in. Similar to our DK Metcalf film room, we’ll break Harrison’s tape into his run defense, coverage, blitz/rush, usage, and special teams.
Run Defense
Harrison is cut from a similar cloth as Roberts. In profile and athletic testing, there are parallels. While Harrison is taller at 6025 and bigger overall, they both ran in the 4.6’s coming out of college and impressed in their verts and broads that measured explosiveness. Harrison jumped 36 inches in the vert and 10’2″ in the broad compared to Roberts’ 36-inch and 10’0″ numbers in the same events.
Like Roberts, Harrison prefers to play downhill. He can fill his gap and hold the point of attack and at his best, take on and shed blocks. He is No. 40 in all the clips throughout this breakdown.
As we’ll explain more in the usage section below, Harrison toggled between off-ball linebacker and EDGE in Baltimore. He’s capable of setting the edge and slipping blocks or stringing runs out along the perimeter.
But his tape is up-and-down. Harrison can be too easily controlled, stuck, and washed.
As a tackler, Harrison does a nice job working clean and squared up and he’s able to flash hit power. But he’s prone to slipping off bigger and more powerful runners, struggling to consistently get down Steelers’ backs Najee Harris and Jaylen Warren in their three 2024 meetings.
Pro Football Reference charged him with 10 missed tackles and a whopping 15.6-perent missed tackle rate. Of the 84 defenders with at least 50 total tackles in 2024, Harrison’s rate was tied for 14th-highest among all positions and fourth-worst of any linebacker.
Coverage
Harrison is a pure underneath zone defender. He gives effort and chase across the field but takes short, choppy steps and doesn’t cover much ground. He won’t carry and run with tight ends in coverage and quarterbacks regularly threw over top of him, Harrison unable to get depth to squeeze throws. The rare time he was in man coverage, he struggled, including giving up a touchdown grab to Cordarrelle Patterson.
He’ll need to improve his ability to key and diagnosis. Harrison is often a tick late and fooled by false pullers and play-action, causing him to be late to get depth in zone. In the second, watch his delay dropping into coverage compared to No. 0 Roquan Smith beside him.
In the open field, he delivers solid hit power and the ability to wrap up in open grass. That’s a positive.
Blitz/Rush
Harrison has worked on the edge and as an off-ball rusher. He’s more effective with the latter though not proficient in either. He’s a power rusher who looks to run through with limited swipes and hand use to beat blocks. His rush can produce power and collapse the pocket. Watch him leverage Najee Harris in the first clip and in the second, squeeze the gap to pressure Justin Herbert that led to an eventual sack from teammates.
Harrison picked up his first two NFL sacks this season. But those come with qualifiers. The first came when Broncos QB Bo Nix lost track of the sideline and stepped out of bounds with Harrison rushing but never contacting him. The other came against the New York Giants but a play where Harrison initially dropped into coverage before rushing after a scrambling Tim Boyle, who slid to avoid contact.
Usage
Defensively, Harrison logged snaps between outside and inside linebacker throughout the 2024 season. Per Pro Football Focus, he logged 64 at left outside linebacker, 98 at right outside linebacker, and 196 at off-ball linebacker during the regular season.
He began the year seeing limited defensive playing time and aligning more often on the edge than at off-ball. But when the Ravens benched Trenton Simpson later in the year, Harrison, along with Chris Board, saw an uptick in snaps. His first start of the season came in Week 11 against Pittsburgh and 316 of his 372 regular season defensive snaps, 84.9-percent, came during or after Week 9.
Largely, Harrison played EDGE in Baltimore’s five-down fronts. Like many teams around the NFL, the Ravens used 5-1 and occasional 5-2 looks on run downs that rolled Harrison up on the line of scrimmage. In their 4-3 or 4-2-5 fronts, he played off-ball. Here’s a look at both.
He was primarily used on run downs and removed in passing situations. Very similar to Roberts, who didn’t play in two-minute drills or dime packages. Harrison is a base personnel/early down type of linebacker.
Special Teams
Importantly, Harrison has an extensive special teams resume. Since being drafted in 2020, he’s logged 1,558 special teams snaps, seventh-most league-wide. It’s a similar figure as Miles Killebrew and Tyler Matakevich.
https://twitter.com/Alex_Kozora/status/1899287080280207394
For the past three seasons, Harrison logged at least 300 special teams snaps. A five-phase player, here’s how PFF charted his 2024 usage:
Kick Coverage: 89 snaps
Kick Return: 72 snaps
Punt Return: 65 snaps
Field Goal Rush: 56 snaps
Punt Coverage: 54 snaps
Per Pro Football Reference, Harrison led the Ravens with 12 special teams tackles during his five-year career with Baltimore. Here’s just one example from 2024, making a tackle for little return against the Cincinnati Bengals.
And here he is blocking a fourth quarter field goal in 2022 against the Cleveland Browns, preserving a three-point lead.
Final Thoughts
Malik Harrison was seemingly signed to fill a similar role as Roberts. A run-down, base 3-4 grouping of snaps as part of a three-man unit with Payton Wilson playing in nickel and Patrick Queen in an every down role. Harrison should continue to offer plenty of special teams value, maximizing his gameday role knowing he may only play 15-20 defensive snaps per game.
On the plus side, Harrison is younger and a stronger special teamer than Roberts who has more inside/outside versatility, though it remains to be seen how much work at outside linebacker he’ll see. Negatively, he’s not the intense tone setter Roberts was against the run and is comparatively weaker. Even in coverage, while both have been used in limited fashion, Roberts was more instinctive and sound.
Who knows why Roberts wasn’t brought back. It couldn’t have been financially-related given Roberts signed a one-year deal for $3 million while Harrison’s contract averaged $5 million per year over two seasons. Maybe Pittsburgh wanted to get younger and predicted Roberts’ game was going to fall off. Contracts are as much about where a player is going as much where he’s been.
One-to-one, this feels like a downgrade for more money. But the important part that will determine the strength of the front seven and run defense will be found in how the Steelers improve the defensive line, chiefly by replacing Larry Ogunjobi, how Payton Wilson progresses in Year Two in the NFL, and how Patrick Queen finds his footing in his second season with Pittsburgh. If Wilson takes a big step forward as a sophomore, it wouldn’t be surprising to see him eat away at Harrison’s snaps and put him in a reserve and special teams role.
