Will Steelers’ DB tweaks equal big Minkah Fitzpatrick plays?

PITTSBURGH — For the first time in his career, four-time Pro Bowl safety Minkah Fitzpatrick finished a season of football without recording a single interception.

Prior to 2023, that had never happened. Not in five NFL seasons, not at Alabama, not at St. Peter’s Prep in New Jersey.

Even more frustrating for the three-time All-Pro selection, his statistical goose-egg season, albeit one shortened by injuries, came after recording a career-high six interceptions in 2022 — including a pick-6 on quarterback Joe Burrow’s first pass attempt of the season.

With a restocked secondary and new season on the horizon, Fitzpatrick has one goal for 2024.

“Just let me play ball — Minkah Ball,” Fitzpatrick said, answering a question about what the defense can do to get him in a better position to make plays. “We’ve got to look at the ’22 tape and see what we did there.”

The Steelers will undoubtedly study the film from 2022, but a stat line study reveals a difference in the schemes, too. In 2022, Fitzpatrick lined up at free safety for 76% of his defensive snaps. In 2023, Fitzpatrick’s percentage of snaps at free safety decreased to 51%, according to data from ESPN Stats and Info. With injuries and suspensions significantly affecting the secondary, Fitzpatrick moved around more in 2023, playing 16% of snaps in the slot compared to just 8% a year earlier. And he spent nearly 30% of snaps lined up in the box, marking a new career high.

Defensive coordinator Teryl Austin admitted that positioning didn’t allow Fitzpatrick to play to his strengths. Correcting that is atop Austin’s priorities for the 2024 season.

“The biggest thing is as coaches, our job is to try to get all of our guys in the best position as possible so they can play as well as they can and play up to their abilities,” Austin said. “And so last year I probably failed in that regard. We tried to have him do too much stuff, and I think I’m going to get back to really what makes him special.”

An instinctual player, one cut from the same cloth as Hall of Fame Steelers safety Troy Polamalu, Fitzpatrick is undoubtedly at his best when he’s playing free safety and able to read the whole field. During his rookie season in Miami, then-head coach Brian Flores moved Fitzpatrick around frequently, causing the safety to voice his frustration with his role that ultimately contributed to him being traded to the Steelers in 2019. Once in Pittsburgh that season, Fitzpatrick played almost exclusively at free safety and racked up five interceptions in 14 games for his new team. The bulk of his snaps the next three seasons also came at free safety, until a lack of depth caused him to move around more often in 2023.

But with new roster additions ahead of the 2024 season, Fitzpatrick and the defense are better positioned for a return to “Minkah ball.” Not only is safety Damontae Kazee back following a three-game suspension to end the regular season, but the Steelers also added veterans in safety DeShon Elliott and versatile cornerback Cameron Sutton.

Though he played mostly outside corner prior to his release in Detroit, Sutton previously showed an ability to be a swiss army knife in the secondary during his six-season stint in Pittsburgh, and he figures to fill a hole in the slot in his return — pending a potential suspension by the NFL for violating the league’s personal conduct policy.

“He’s been in the system for a long time,” Fitzpatrick said of Sutton. “He’s been in the league for a long time, so he has experience. He’s a versatile player — he can play corner, he can play nickel, he could play dime, even safety if he had to. It’s another chess piece to the chess board for us.”

The Steelers also have Darius Rush as an option in the slot, along with rookie safety Ryan Watts, whose speed and 6-3 frame make him an intriguing candidate for the position.

“Minkah is at his best when he’s playing back a little bit deeper, seeing things and able to react and see the game,” Austin said. “He sees it really fast, and so my job is to try to keep him back there as much as possible and keep him out of situations where he’s blitzing and doing that stuff — not that he can’t [blitz], but he’s better doing the other things, and that’s where the other additions come in.

“You got guys that are able to handle some of those duties that [Fitzpatrick] kind of picked up last year, so we’re going to have other guys do those duties and let Minkah get back to where he’s really — not just good, exceptional.”

It also doesn’t hurt that the Steelers are primed to enter the 2024 season with a much healthier inside linebacking corps thanks to the addition of Patrick Queen and Payton Wilson, something that should also reduce Fitzpatrick’s time lining up in the box and allow the team to play more nickel defense.

“He’s a high IQ guy, and I think just adding a guy like that in a linebacker room is something that we need,” Fitzpatrick said of Queen, and something that is going to be very valuable this upcoming season.”

Can that help Fitzpatrick play “Minkah Ball?”

“As many great players as you could get in the field,” he said, “is going to help Minkah play Minkah ball.”