Steelers mitigate risk
Steelers have a haven at Heinz Field
“Love of football” at heart of what team does to guard against COVID-19.
Danny Smith turns 67 in November, and he would love to celebrate his birthday by coaching against the Dallas Cowboys the next day. Having cake on the couch while watching the Steelers play on TV was never the plan.
As one of the oldest but also most animated members of Mike Tomlin’s coaching staff, the special-teams coordinator was asked Wednesday morning if he had given much thought to opting out of the 2020 NFL season. That was on the table for any coach or players who didn’t feel comfortable competing in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic and navigating the murky waters of a virus that puts older adults at higher risk than other swaths of the population, per Centers for Disease Control and Prevention studies.
“It never entered my mind, man. I don’t do nothin’ but coach football,” Smith said while laughing in a Zoom conference call. “I don’t have any hobbies. I don’t have nothing.”
Contrast that with the 2020 player pool, of which 69 players decided to opt out despite being a workforce that isn’t as old as the league’s coaches and is much younger than Smith specifically. Meanwhile, in Pittsburgh, not a single player chose to forgo this season, one of three teams that can say that.
“I think by our guys not opting out, it shows you the love of football these guys have,” Steelers defensive line coach Karl Dunbar, 53, said Monday. “And the willingness and understanding that the Steelers are going to take care of them.”
Tomlin, who at 48 is still younger than half the league’s head coaches, has a staff made up mostly of his elders. According to a recent ESPN analysis of every team, the Steelers have the highest average age of their head coach and coordinators, at 58.5. That includes Smith, as well as offensive coordinator Randy Fichtner, 56, and defensive coordinator Keith Butler, 64.
But while age is a risk factor for coaches (and officials, of whom seven opted out, including two replay officials), players have their own situations to consider. All-Pro defensive lineman Cam Heyward has been firm all along in his conviction to play in 2020, and even after the NFL announced specifics on the opt-out package, Heyward didn’t change his mind — despite being categorized as a “high-risk” player because he has asthma.
“For me, it was a conversation that I had to have with not only myself, but my wife, my family and my agent,” Heyward said Monday. “I felt comfortable going forward, seeing the certain protocols. Obviously, I’m taking care of my body. Outside of the football field, I’m making sure I make the right decision.”
Making “the right decision” has been a talking point for the Steelers since the start of camp, when Tomlin espoused his “one-fail, all-fail” mentality on preventing an outbreak within the team. But only those inside the organization know the exact messaging from team officials on how to live life when they leave Heinz Field each day.
For second-year running back Benny Snell, his main takeaway from communication with coaches has been to avoid large spaces where there might be a lot of people. Snell, who has a fun-loving personality but also a penchant for spending much of his free time playing video games to begin with, is keeping it even simpler for himself.
“Personally, I just go to work and I go home,” he said Wednesday. “I have everything I need. I don’t need to put myself in situations where there’s other people there or whatever the case may be. We just keep it to home and in here.”
“In here” is the stadium, which has been a sanctuary for football but is also where 100-some players and staffers are closely interacting on a daily basis. It would be naive to believe that not a single one of 80 players is occasionally venturing out to a bar or restaurant in his free time, but, for the most part, the Steelers are simply doing what they can to ensure a virtual bubble.
While a few teams have elected to make more of a literal bubble by sequestering themselves at a team hotel, at least for training camp, the Steelers continue to roll along at Heinz Field. And they haven’t had to place a player on the reserve/ COVID-19 list since Aug. 2.
“It hasn’t been anything we’ve talked about, and I haven’t been paying much attention to it,” James Conner, another Steeler classified as high-risk given his cancer history, said of other teams’ isolation tactics.
“We haven’t been talking about being in a bubble and whatnot. We’re taking all the necessary precautions here at Heinz and making it work. It’s been running smooth so far.”