The Pittsburgh Steelers’ 2025 draft class included several themes. It focuses clearly on football defenders’ upgrades. Big Ten lead trends. Focus on young people when teams are formed. Draft players who can seamlessly transition from university to professionals. The same could also apply to members of the 2024 draft class, including DL Logan Lee. Coming to Pittsburgh from Iowa, two systems that share many of the same principles have reduced NFL jumps and become a natural step up.
“Learning a college playbook in Iowa was much more difficult than learning an NFL playbook,” he told Matt Randazzo. Off the Air Podcast. “I don’t know if that’s more difficult in itself. Maybe it’s just because I came from high school, it’s the same as some stunt play all day. And you need to run 90 different phones in two seconds. [window]. It’s wild. ”
It’s not in the shade in Pittsburgh. Instead, it’s true that Iowa’s “pro-style” defense has sought a lot from players and has set them up for the NFL. Like Nick Savan and those from Alabama, they were running what was essentially an NFL-style defense in the university system. Create one hurdle as rookies assimilate into the pro.
Lee starred at Orion High School in Illinois, playing offensive and defensive line. He left with 35 bags as the school’s greatest leader ever, making it 36-10 in his career. An impressive school show with only about 300 students. The small school led to an equally skimmed playbook without overloading the roster, which already faces many challenges.
Jumping to power programs like Iowa was more jarring than Lee moving from college to the NFL. However, the similarities between the Hawkeyes and Steelers were not dramatic. In an interview, Lee said his job in college was to occupy the block and allow linebackers to run freely.
This System Fit is one of the reasons why Pittsburgh drafted first-round Derrick Harmon, who played Oregon’s 3-4 front, which was very similar to the one run by the Steelers. Also, Pittsburgh is no coincidence that he added a lot of Lee’s teammates.
“Now, even the Iowans in Pittsburgh, especially the defensive, they understand that ‘this isn’t too bad. It’s very easy to install.’ Yes, we did 90 different plays that we had to mature a lot in Iowa.
Pittsburgh drafted two Hawkeyes this year, selecting RB Kaleb Johnson in the third round and NT Yahya Black in the fifth. Safety Sebastian Castro was scooped up as an undrafted free agent.
Wisconsin. Iowa. Oregon. Pittsburgh’s closest defensive system for college football. To reduce forecasts and thus risk, the Steelers rely on investment in those schools. All that’s done is to build one of the most consistent NFL defenses. This is the unit that finished the top 10 with five points out of the last six years.
