PITTSBURGH (93.7 The Fan) – Darren Waller has played against the Steelers before, you probably don’t remember. Four games with the Ravens between 2015 and 2018. He totaled four catches for 45 yards on seven targets.
In one game with the Raiders against the Ravens Monday, the now 29-year-old targeted 19 times with 10 receptions for 105 yards and a touchdown.
“One of the best that’s doing it right now,” said Steelers linebacker Melvin Ingram. “You got to give respect where respect due. We got to play assignment football and try and cancel him out.”
“His size and his speed and his ability to catch a ball,” said Steelers linebacker TJ Watt. “He is always creating separation. That is what is really special about him. You know he is getting the ball. He’s going to get targeted X amount of times. You watch the game from Monday, they are throwing the ball his way. He’s still getting separation. He’s still about to come down with a lot of those key catches.”
“Everybody in the stadium is going to know we have to eliminate him. The real test is if we can really do it or not.”
In his last six games, the former Ravens sixth round pick targeted 74 times with 53 catches for 759 yards and five touchdowns. Compare that to the last six regular season games of KC’s Travis Kelce (62-targets, 45-catches, 596 yards) and SF’s George Kittle (40-targets, 26-catches, 421 yards).
“You can describe him as a tight end, but I think that that seems less than appropriate, to be honest with you,” said Steelers head coach Mike Tomlin. “That's putting him in a box. This guy's a dynamic, big athlete. I'm watching the game (Monday) night and looking at his measurables; man, he's more similar to [Chase] Claypool than he is any tight end that we have on our roster in terms of measurables and fluidity of movement and body control.”
“So, we’d better respect him in that vein. I think people that are unfamiliar with those guys try to treat him like a tight end and maybe cover him the way you would cover normal tight ends. You're really setting yourself up for a long evening, not only in terms of his talents but just his role.”
“He had 19 targets. You can't talk about stopping somebody that they're committing to getting the ball to like that. We just have to work to minimize his impact on the game. We had a similar mentality about [Stefon] Diggs a week ago. We’d better respect him and his capabilities, their utilization of him, and how he fits within what it is that they do.”
Jerry Rice, Tim Brown, Warren Sapp, Derrick Brooks, Charles Woodson, John Lynch—they all played for Raiders head coach Jon Gruden. It’s Waller who Gruden said is the best player he’s ever coached.
How do the Steelers defend this unique 6’6”, 255 pound offensive weapon? The last six coaches Waller faced had plans. How can the Steelers defend him? Will they rotate defenders on him? Have a player like Cam Sutton shadow him? Play zone to keep him in front of them?
“I'm not going to disclose any of them,” Tomlin said of his defensive plans. “Options are good, and not only in terms of changing people up, but number of people. You’d better be prepared to deal with 19 targets.”
“We’re gonna do a lot of things against Waller,” said Steelers defensive coordinator Keith Butler. “I’m not going to tell you what we’re doing.
We’ve got some versatile guys in the back end and we’re going to use them. Is versatility and variety the key to a guy like that?”
Then there are the late injuries to linebacker Devin Bush and corner Joe Haden. Both are dealing with groin issues and if they can’t play it will limit the Steelers creativity. One part of the Steelers game that can disrupt any offensive plan, the pass rush.
“Well, the key to try to dadgum mess with the quarterback a little bit,” Butler said. “We’re not trying to over-think this thing, but at the same time, we know what they’re looking at too. They’re gonna keep looking at what they’ve been looking at, the quarterback’s still gonna keep his same reads, so hopefully we can give them a little bit of problems in terms of what they’re looking at.”