One snap, Jaylen Samuels was at wideout.
Another, he was in the backfield.
Another, he was aligned to Ben Roethlisberger's left as de facto bodyguard.
"Everywhere, right?" the kid would tell me in confirming all of the above following the Steelers' OTA session Tuesday morning at the Rooney Complex. "But that's OK. I like it like that. Get me on the field. Challenge me to do something. I'll get the job done."
Everyone remembers Samuels, right?
If not, then maybe a reminder is merited of his 172 total yards against the Patriots this past season:
Catch the pattern in play?
Yep. Wideout. Backfield. Bodyguard. Did it all. Just like the New England victory. Just like his time at N.C. State, where he played just about every position except running back.
James Conner's fresh off a bone-crushing breakout. Benny Snell's the fresh-faced rookie in the fold. But Samuels might be in the best position -- literally -- to fill Le'Veon Bell's void. And if you ask me, that has him poised to make as much of a positive difference as anyone on the offense.
Never mind that he reported for OTAs 15 pounds lighter than last season -- pushed hard by Randy Fichtner to do precisely that -- with an primary aim of finding sharper acceleration on passing routes and hitting holes faster out of the backfield to better capitalize on his DeAngelo Williams slashing style.
On top of that, if Conner can carry the load again, and if Snell winds up even half as dynamic as most everyone here seems to be expecting, Samuels can pretty much entrench himself as the third down back ... if not more.
I asked Samuels if he felt a little forgotten amid all the fuss over Snell.
"I mean, it's always been like that all my life, throughout college, I've always been forgotten," Samuels told me through a slight smile. "I'm just waiting for the season to start. We'll see."
Good for him. Here's our whole talk:
Ideally, it plays out this way: Conner stays healthy. Snell shows the combined physicality/flair that both spells Conner and provides a different dimension. And Samuels cements himself into the portions of the playbook that once only Bell could fill. That can be split among drives, with Conner taking a couple and Snell the next, or it can be split among downs and situations, with Samuels available for a wild-card element.
Regardless, what's paramount over this summer is that all three, who've openly been speaking about being amenable to a multiple-back system, really mean it.
"I'm all for it," Conner was saying a few days ago. "Those guys are talented. I mean, obviously, who doesn't want the ball? But they can make some plays that I can't make. You look around the league, you see a lot of teams using multiple backs. I'm all for it."
Could be fun, huh?
• Have to love Ramon Foster's candor Tuesday when asked about Roger Goodell's remarks over the weekend that the NFL should cut the preseason schedule in half and add two games to the regular season. "Trashy football" in the early going is what Foster predicted for such a scenario, and he's undoubtedly right. It'd take while for everyone to get going, particularly the regulars.
In the same breath, though, Foster, speaking from his pulpit as the team's union rep, also tried to make a case for keeping all four preseason games, in part because it presents more opportunities for fringe players to make an impression.
Eh.
If the players' union is genuinely worried about fringe players, it would be far more potent to push for a true minor-league system. That's more jobs, more firsthand exposure to professional football across the country and, ultimately, more opportunities for young versions of Foster, who himself went undrafted coming out of Tennessee.
• Right back at Roger, if I'm the union: Drop the insane Thursday night games, and we'll talk.
• The Steelers have had safeties in the recent past who viewed their roles as so much more than making interceptions. Mike Mitchell, in particular, would get openly defiant about it. So it was refreshing, to a degree, to hear Sean Davis assess as bluntly as possible that his one pick in 2018 wasn't acceptable, just as it's been reassuring to hear the same from Terrell Edmunds.
To stress: This defense had eight in 2018. That's it. And that's awful, not just unacceptable. One more field-flipping play is all it'd have taken to put that team into the playoffs. In Oakland. In New Orleans. In Cleveland. In any number of situations.
Within that, though, there's caution to be had. The defense, for all the grief they get, ranked No. 6 in the NFL in total defense, allowing 327.2 yards per game. That's damned good. And that's largely the result of a tackle-the-catch approach that was Dick LeBeau's foundation for the secondary, one from which Mike Tomlin and Keith Butler haven't exactly strayed. Steer the safeties and corners too hard toward takeaways, and the risk of conceding splash only rises.
• More than anything, I'd say, these guys just need to get their hands on the ball, you know?
If the mindset is to play the position as they've always played it, but be more aware of the ball, more aware of practicing making plays on the ball, that alone could go a long way.
• If we were permitted by NFL regulations to report on what we witness in OTA drills, I'd hypothetically share with you here that Devin Bush is hypothetically making all kinds of plays on the hypothetical ball. But I hypothetically can't do that, so I hypothetically won't.
• It's been amusing to hear, seemingly after every other pass in these drills, players joking about throwing a challenge flag for interference. Roethlisberger did that a couple times. But soon, it'll be no laughing matter, as the NFL's Competition Committee, of which Tomlin is a member, is expected to afford coaches the right to challenge interference in the final two minutes of a half or in overtime. Originally, interference was expected to stay squarely in the domain of replay officials.
The one exception: Hail Mary passes. The reason given by Rich McKay, the Falcons' president, is that the league doesn't like games ending on a review, and every losing team will challenge every key completion. This is tremendous foresight. One can easily envision, oh, Joe Flacco heaving it a mile in the sky hoping for interference and using challenges as a strategy.
• If you still think the Steelers are unlikable, you'd do well to spend five minutes with Stephon Tuitt. He's everything they're really about. Zillion-watt smile, equally fiery passion for the game, for his team and for his own performance. A joy to be around.
• Chosen a side yet between Josh Dobbs and Mason Rudolph?
I haven't. There's too much respect here for how Dobbs stepped up last summer and achieved what -- at the time, anyway -- was unthinkable in getting Landry Jones released. He's too intelligent, too athletic to be dismissed.
At the same time, it's hard to watch Rudolph's poise and precision and not pull for him to push Dobbs hard, if not overtake him. The ceiling feels so much higher.
Our chat on this might offer some insight as to his makeup:
• Tomlin's annual team-building OTA exercise this summer sent everyone down I-79 to the Topgolf driving range, where the greatest range apparently was in the quality of the swings.
Ryan Switzer, who's roughly the size of one of Cam Heyward's legs, mustered the courage to remark, "Oh, 97 was awful. Just terrible."
To which Cam later retorted, "You know ... Switz plays with baby clubs, so let’s calm down. Switz can hold my clubs next time we go."
Quite the circus.
