When Devin Bush was lost for the season Sunday, one could feel the collective emotional anxiety from Steelers fans thinking back to past times.
Not again!
That's because everyone remembers how the defense lost Ryan Shazier toward the end of a 13-3 regular season in 2017 and how that loss forced the entire defense to restructure how it worked.
Shazier was the center pillar to how that defense was propped up and losing him without a capable replacement at Mack inside linebacker was devastating, forcing Keith Butler to draw up emergency sellout schemes that required big-time risks and exposed vulnerabilities because of how much Shazier's talent masked the rest of the issues on the Steelers' defense.
This is not the same situation.
And that's not a dig on Bush for any lack of talent on his end, it's acknowledging that the 2020 Steelers' defense is much more equipped than the 2017 version.
Just think about it. Outside of Joe Haden, Vince Williams, with Mike Hilton and Cameron Sutton both on their first years with the team, the off-ball defenders were completely different:
2017:
• Artie Burns
• Coty Sensabaugh
• Sean Davis
• Mike Mitchell
2020:
• Steven Nelson
• Terrell Edmunds
• Minkah Fitzpatrick
The whole point of Shazier's role in the 2017 defense was to let him be the X-factor player that covered the vulnerabilities of all the other defenders.
Bush's role wasn't about covering for anyone else's weaknesses, just playing to his own strengths while the rest of the defense filled in their roles. Butler has a much more competent and athletic group to work with behind his defensive front. Even when Bush was in he felt comfortable sending him on blitzes because he had the athletes to cover and disguise the middle of the field.
A perfect example is Fitzpatrick's pick-six on Baker Mayfield, where the defense shows a Cover 2 scheme with him and Edmunds lined up deep. At the snap of the ball, Fitzpatrick jumps down into a robber zone while Edmunds drops back to play deep centerfield, making a Cover 1 defense. It's the Steelers' bread and butter with Fitzpatrick and it worked to perfection, even without Bush involved in the coverage:
That's the flexibility this defense has even without Bush working in coverage.
And again, this isn't to knock Bush's coverage skills or say he wasn't doing a lot in coverage. Sure his stats don't look that great with 26 tackles, a sack, three passes defensed and no interceptions through four and a half games. But his athleticism helped the Steelers a ton in underneath coverage.
That can be seen when you notice the Steelers have only given up 16 receptions to running backs, the fewest in the NFL. And that's facing athletic and capable receiving threats out of the backfield like Saquon Barkley, David Johnson, Melvin Gordon, Miles Sanders and now Kareem Hunt.
That also applies to tight ends, with the Steelers only giving up 20 receptions to the position this season, seventh fewest in the NFL, despite 40 targets by opponents on tight ends, which is the 13th most in the league. One of Bush's passes defensed came while covering Darren Fells in the end zone and saving a touchdown throw from Deshaun Watson.
So again, not belittling Bush about any of his coverage skills.
But because of how well-rounded the defense is with athleticism and competent off-ball players that can play proficiently while jumping between disguised coverages, how Robert Spillane, Ulysees Gilbert and Marcus Allen might fill in for Bush doesn't require for Butler to completely remake the defense like he tried to do at the end of 2017 for Shazier's absence.
Here's an example of that when the Steelers showed Cover 2 again, but this time jumped into a Cover 3 zone. First, notice Spillane as the line linebacker patrolling the middle of the field. Then look behind him where Fitzpatrick and Edmunds are showing Cover 2 by lining up as the two deep safeties. This time it's Edmunds who flies up at the snap of the ball while Fitzpatrick drops back to play deep centerfield. Spillane goes from looking like the only underneath zone defender in coverage to shifting over to work with Edmunds.
The two pinch the seam route of Jarvis Landry to see if Mayfield will try to thread the needle between them, then when he checks down to Austin Hooper, Spillane promptly hits and wraps to take him down short of the marker and force a third down:
That's not a splash play, but a display of competent work by Spillane to test how much Mayfield was willing to gamble and then limiting the check down pass from becoming a big play.
There's chemistry in this Steelers defense that gives Butler a lot of flexibility to draw up blitzes and different coverage disguises without having to settle for complete mismatches and compromise the entire defense. That involves bringing pressure and backing it up with competent coverage.
Here's an example where Hilton comes off the edge on a blitz, ready to play the run but adjusting to pressure Mayfield. Mayfield's first read is David Njoku to the flat, where Edmunds blankets Njoku and breaks up the pass:
That's a lot of competent moving chess pieces to make the defense even without Bush playing a major role in coverage. Even Sutton got involved with his interception of Mayfield in the second quarter.
That's very different than in 2017 when the Steelers were slapping anything they could into the defensive scheme. Here's a perfect example in the regular season finale when DeShone Kizer threw a 56-yard touchdown pass to Rashad Higgins.
Look who the Steelers had to drop into man coverage against Higgins in the slot, T.J. Watt. And a rookie version of Watt that's not nearly as polished and developed as he is today.
You can see how that worked out:
We've already seen a half of football with the team compensating for the loss of Bush and it wasn't bad. After a blown coverage that allowed a second quarter touchdown, the defense shut out the Browns. Hunt was neutralized on the ground and in the air, while the defense took care of big-name threats in Odell Beckham, Landry and Hooper.
Bush will be missed, but this defense will still be able to do the things it does best.