-
Brooke Pryor, editor at ESPN
PITTSBURGH – Two years before Zach Frazier joined the Pittsburgh Steelers, assistant general manager Andy Weidl watched the center mowing down defensive linemen at Acrisure Stadium.
Frazier’s West Virginia team was playing against Pitt in 2022 when he caught the eye of Steelers scouts in attendance.
“I remember Dan Colbert (director of college scouting) coming up to me at halftime and saying, ‘See that center from West Virginia throwing guys to the ground?’ I said, ‘Yeah!’ We both saw it and he was on our radar there.”
Frazier remained on the Steelers’ radar, and two years later, Weidl and the team’s front office selected him with the number 51 pick in the second round of the 2024 NFL Draft. Frazier was expected to eventually take over the starting center position, but a season-ending rotator cuff tear for Nate Herbig all but ensures that the rookie will be a regular in the season opener in Atlanta.
This is not an unfamiliar position for the Steelers, who had then-rookie Kendrick Green start at the position three seasons ago and then-rookie Maurkice Pouncey at center in 2010. But with Frazier, the Steelers seem better positioned to repeat Pouncey’s success than Green’s problems.
“Zach has played a lot of games as a center,” said offensive coordinator Arthur Smith. “It’s not the NFL, but he’s made it in the Power 5. I think he’s a very mature guy. You ask a lot of your centers, but I would say he’s probably the most prepared of all the rookies, and that’s what we thought when we drafted him. Since he’s been in this building, he’s been everything you’d expect him to be.”
Frazier, who turns 23 next week, came to Pittsburgh having started 37 consecutive games as a center. By comparison, Pouncey was selected in the first round of the 2010 draft after starting 39 games as a center for Florida.
The next step to the NFL comes with a number of growing pains, but like Pouncey, Frazier’s pain is minimized because he continues to play the same position he held in college. That wasn’t the case in 2021, when the Steelers decided to move Green, their third-round pick, from guard to center to fill the void left by Pouncey’s retirement. As a result, his development was accelerated, and the line play suffered.
“He was in an unfortunate situation,” tackle Dan Moore Jr. said of Green. “Being a guard in college and then making the transition to center and having to be the man from Day 1, obviously it’s a difficult task and it hurt his development a lot. We had to skip a lot of things in the process just to get him ready for Week 1 and that sped up his development a little bit so he didn’t really get to learn the little nuances and techniques that a center has to learn.”
“Since Zach has already started 37 times as a center in college, it’s a big help for the coaches not to have to train him as much. He just understands the position a little better.”
Frazier represents a shift in the Steelers’ mindset when it comes to selecting offensive linemen, as the organization prioritized college experience in its 2024 selections. Frazier spent four years at West Virginia, starting 46 games total as a center and guard. First-round pick Troy Fautanu spent five seasons in Washington, starting 31 games in his final three seasons. And fourth-round pick Mason McCormick, considered the Steelers’ best reserve interior lineman, spent six seasons at South Dakota State, starting every game in his final three seasons.
That’s a stark contrast from a season ago, when the Steelers used their first-round pick on Broderick Jones, who started just 19 times in his three-year career at Georgia. Jones, born in May 2001, is a year younger than McCormick, seven months younger than Fautanu and three months older than Frazier.
“They’re all older guys,” said 30-year-old guard Isaac Seumalo. “They played a lot of ball in college and are real professionals. They train hard and are unpretentious. Everything you could ask of an O-line.”
Based on the resumes of the rookie class, Moore, who was one of two rookies to start on the offensive line in 2021, sees a difference in the preparation of this year’s group.
“We’re young, but I feel like we have a lot more game experience,” Moore said. “Hopefully we can build on that when we get to the stadium.”
There is still a learning curve, as the first two preseason games showed. The first unit recorded five sacks in eight series, including three against the Bills. Fautanu and Jones were primarily responsible for the majority of those sacks, which was partly a byproduct of the pair’s inexperience at right tackle.
Although Jones played right tackle last season, he is a natural left tackle and is battling an unspecified arm injury. The Steelers’ front office has also expressed the intention of moving him to left tackle at some point. Fautanu, who also played left tackle for most of his college career, is learning the intricacies of the right side while also battling a knee sprain.
Due to injuries and youth, it may take some time for the line to gel, but the Steelers believe that with Frazier and the other young linemen, they have the right players on the team to regain their organizational identity in the trenches.
“We’re talking about football character, football maturity, and these are guys who were captains,” Weidl said. “They played a lot of football, they loved the game and they played our style. They’re physical.”
“If you want to be a physical, tough team, you recruit physical, tough players, right? Guys that love the game, it’s not a big secret or a magic formula. It’s just like, hey, if you want to be physically big and tough, you recruit physical and tough players, and guys that are smart and love the game.”
