The Steelers' defense needs good, athletic linebackers operating in the middle of the field to make the unit an elite group. All of the great Steelers defenses over the years had dangerous off-ball linebackers who set a tone behind the defensive line. From Jack Lambert and Jack Ham of the 1970s, to Levon Kirkland in the 1990s, to James Farrior in the 2000s, linebacker has been a vital part of each of the eight AFC championships the Steelers have had in the Super Bowl era.
That's why Mike Tomlin and Kevin Colbert were adamant about getting Devin Bush in the 2019 NFL Draft, and why the team made sure to lock up Myles Jack in free agency this year. Bush started his career off by recording the most tackles ever by a rookie for the franchise before suffering a second-year injury that he's still working his way back to 100 percent from. But Jack appears to be a bit of an insurance policy for the team should Bush not return to form in 2022 after a struggling 2021 season.
Jack's presence on the field as a 26-year old linebacker is an athletic linebacker who diagnoses plays quickly, explodes to the ball carrier and can tackle from sideline to sideline while also helping in coverage. In many ways, he's the style of linebacker the Steelers hoped Bush would develop into, and now the two get to play together. Jack's addition to the roster gives Bush the most athletic partner he's had in the NFL, but also puts him on notice that if Bush doesn't fix his game, his replacement after his rookie contract runs out after this season is standing right next to him in the huddle.
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What does Jack do well?
A lot, if you look at the tape.
He's recorded over 100 tackles in three of his six seasons with the Jaguars, including last year when he led the team with 108. When he lines up in the middle of a defense, Jack looks prepared to read and react to any given play and properly read his keys to put himself in position to attack. This was something Bush did well before his ACL tear in 2019, and what Jack could help Bush regain.
Watch how calmly Jack diagnoses this option run in 2020 when he had to play the edge as either Deshaun Watson and David Johnson could have taken the ball for a run. Jack played inside linebacker and had to come down to the edge as his defensive front crashed to the inside. But once he was in position, that allowed him to pinch the edge behind his linemen and finish Johnson's run at the line of scrimmage with a solid tackler:
Jack's tape over the past six seasons is riddle with plays like that. He was always at his best when the Jaguars' defensive line could keep him clean from opposing offensive linemen so he could read and diagnose the play, then quickly explode to bring down the ball carrier.
This was the style of play Bush displayed while playing behind Cam Heyward, Stephon Tuitt and Tyson Alualu in his best games between 2019 and 2020. But with Tuitt and Alualu gone for the season in 2021, Bush had very little cover from offensive linemen trying to get to the second level to block linebackers. That put him at a disadvantage and will be something the Steelers need to make sure isn't a problem in 2022 for both Bush and Jack.
Jack isn't as green as Bush in dealing with blockers, but it's also not his best strength. That being said, he still does a solid job when he diagnoses a play and knows he has to attack a lineman to win a gap. Watch this tackle he made against Joe Mixon in 2020, as he recognized the chance to shut the play down by rushing A-gap. Once he exploded, Jack pushed through the Bengals' guard and brought down Mixon:
Since Jack entered the NFL in 2016, he's recorded 513 tackles. That's 25th-best among all defensive players in the league during that six-year span. During the majority of that time, he played on a struggling Jaguars team that only managed a single winning season in 2017. Outside of the 10-win season that featured a playoff victory over the Steelers, the Jaguars have averaged 3.6 wins over the other five seasons Jack has played on their roster.
It's tough to be a strong, detailed player in the middle of that much chaos. But Jack showed time and time again he could be that kind of player. He also flashed the ability to run, cover and hit while keeping the play in front of him throughout his years with the Jaguars. He's not a coverage phenom, but he's an athletic linebacker who's agile enough to turn, run and blanket players in open space to make passing windows harder for NFL quarterbacks. During his six seasons he's only recorded three interceptions and 15 passes defensed.
Jack won't turn and run 30-yards downfield with Travis Kelce with blanketing coverage, but he will properly play zone coverage and make receiving difficult for targets in front of him. Watch this play against Lamar Jackson in 2020 when Jack dropped back into an intermediate zone assignment. When Willie Snead came into his area, Jack was ready to pounce. But while reading Jackson's eyes, he rolled with Snead as Jackson extended the play, and made sure to apply a tackle that would include his hands punching through Snead's and he forced an incomplete pass:
Make no mistake, Jack isn't a coverage savant. But he sticks to his fundamentals enough that when he's challenged and in position, he'll make a play.
Watch this interception of Joe Burrow from 2020, when Jack initially bit on play action at the goal line and had to quickly react to cover Bengals tight end Drew Sample. Jack immediately knew who his assignment was, where they were going and knew his best chance to make a play was to close down the passing window by running to Sample and then putting his hands right where Sample's were to fight for the ball. When the pass came down into Sample's hands, Jack's hands proved stronger and yanked the ball away for a red zone interception:
Fighting through the hands is a defensive fundamental that gets preached a lot across the NFL, and especially in the Steelers' meetings. It allows the defender to keep their eyes on the man they're covering and focus on a single part of coverage, their opposing receivers' hands. Often times defenders will get caught staring down the quarterback or looking up in the air for the ball, which leads to missing the play entirely and allowing the reception.
Jack seems content with sticking to those fundamentals in his tape and letting the play come to him. That will be something Tomlin welcomes in Teryl Austin's defense. But Jack also isn't against making big plays to force turnovers when the opportunity arises, as the Steelers found out in their playoff loss to the Jaguars in Jan. 2018. Early in the first quarter the Steelers had the ball while down 7-0 and Ben Roethlisberger thought to target Vance McDonald on an out route.
Jack was covering McDonald and absorbed McDonald's initial attempt to create separation so he could properly trail the tight end. When Roethlisberger didn't lead McDonald to the sideline, Jack put his hands right where McDonald's were, and tipped the ball to himself for a major interception:
Jack won't make a ton of plays like that for the Steelers, but combine doing that occasionally with his tackling ability and play recognition skills and it could be a major change in defensive production for the Steelers' defense.
And if Bush can get his game back to when he looked like a mentally prepared and confident, athletic linebacker who hit all over the field, the Steelers will have two such defenders in the middle of the field. Add that to a replenished defensive line, and it could completely flip the Steelers run defense from being the NFL's worst in 2021 to being one of the best in 2022. If both can be competent in coverage, they can be the centerpieces for a defense with multiple X-factor players in T.J. Watt, Heyward and Minkah Fitzpatrick to be on of the league's most dominant groups.