Steelers Now
PITTSBURGH — The Pittsburgh Steelers wrapped up their three-day rookie minicamp at UPMC Rooney Sports complex on Sunday. The Steelers had two days of open practice sessions and interviews with the media, giving us our first chance to interact with and see the team’s 2025 NFL Draft class and other rookies up close and personal.
The football is not really football. It’s not even — to use Mike Tomlin’s phrase — football in shorts, as the practices that are open to the media are run at walkthrough pace.
But it’s still a good chance to get an up-close and in-person look at what each athlete looks like on the football field, and also another chance to get to learn about the personalities of the players and learn what makes them tick beyond the gridiron.
Here’s five things we learned this weekend on the South Side:
Derrick Harmon is big. Yahya Black needs an even bigger adjective. Massive? Immense? Gargantuan? Gigantic? Enormous? Colossal? Monumental? Take your pick.
The Steelers first- and fifth-round picks in the 2025 NFL Draft were glued at the hip over rookie camp, with the 313-pound Harmon and the 336-pound Black representing major steps in Omar Khan’s massive renovation project on the defensive line.
Yes, they’re big. And they’re strong. Just ask Karl Dunbar. The Steelers defensive line coach was running a drill in practice on Friday when Black hit the pad so hard, it pushed him backward several feet. Dunbar seemed just fine with that development.
#Steelers DL coach Karl Dunbar looks like the happiest guy in the universe with Yahya Black and Derrick Harmon. https://t.co/l68570hyDf pic.twitter.com/dznrEAjeM3
— Alan Saunders (@ASaunders_PGH) May 11, 2025
Of course, we knew they were big. We could see on tape that they were strong. What I learned this week at rookie camp about the The Hulk and The Thing is that they’re surprisingly light on their feet and fluid athletically for how big they are.
A lot of big guys stumble through footwork drills, and a lot of others just have no burst. In my experience, it’s fairly rare for big athletes to have both explosiveness and be light on their feet, and that combination of traits should serve the Steelers’ big men well as they make the transition to the NFL.
Kaleb Johnson is a freak. Step beyond the fact that he runs with an extremely physical style, despite not being the prototypical size for a back like that. Just take a good look at the physical specimen that is Kaleb Johnson. Go find an ounce of body fat on that dude.
“The day before I came here, I was running 3-4 miles on the treadmill,” Johnson said. “Lifted and worked my but off the following day, and now I’m here.”
My dude ran four miles, lifted, and then went to his first NFL practice. That’s truly psychopathic behavior, channelled into the best possible...
