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JuJu Smith-Schuster is ranked among the NFL leaders for receptions and yards. A tumultuous off-season saw him become the main goal of the Pittsburgh Steelers.
What Smith-Schuster wants to change this season is a different player, who adds a dangerous threat to his CV by offering splash games to the Steelers.
"To be able to catch the balls deep on the ground, these balls go, those free balls that they send to the field where I have to go to play these games," said Smith-Schuster. "That's what I focused on a lot, catching the ball over the shoulder and being able to pose a threat to the outside."
Now, I know what you think. This is the same reaction that Ben Roethlisberger had when I relayed the personal goal of Smith-Schuster: the JuJu does not have two touchdowns of 97 yards?
Yes, but they were shooter games where Smith-Schuster converted short passes into gains in length. Now, he wants to be a serious threat of good faith, a receiver that extends into the field. Big Ben then sat on his chair and smiled.
"It just shows the growth of what he wants and wants to be," said Roethlisberger. "I think it's great. If you asked him, "What do you want to improve?" And he said, "Nothing, I'm fine." That's when you have problems, right?
Smith-Schuster led the Steelers with 111 receptions for 1,426 yards and five catches of 40 yards or more, placing in the top six in the league in all three categories. But he will no longer be opposed to Antonio All-Brown, four times total, and Smith-Schuster has all the motivation to prove himself.
That's why he was at work in the training camp, from his soft start to spending extra time catching the JUGS machine's passes every time.
"It was very important," said Smith-Schuster. "Obviously, everything was in the eyes. The big questions: how are the Steelers going to go without two big players we had before? How will JuJu do without AB?
That's the $ 30 million question – or the guaranteed money the Oakland Raiders gave to Brown – and the one Smith-Schuster wants to answer this season before he gets into the last year of his recruit contract. Another season of Pro Bowl caliber and he will be able to ask for a mega deal to him.
Roethlisberger thinks that something else is at stake, the stigma that makes Smith-Schuster lack the speed to get behind the cornerbacks. Smith-Schuster slipped to the second round of Southern Cal because of his 4.54-second time in the 40-yard scorecard and a surveillance report that says he "seldom shows a second report to run under the deep jets ".
This is where Big Ben became defensive.
"I have never do not was targeting him or watching him or throwing him a long ball because that was him, "Roethlisberger said." He's never had to prove anything to me. I think he can do whatever we ask him to do, we ask him to do more than anyone else, we ask him to play the slot machine, at the back, at the front of the trips. very complete receiver. "
Becoming a deep and dangerous threat is therefore the last piece of the puzzle for Smith-Schuster, the so-called missing ingredient to make him the definitive No. 1 receiver of the NFL?
Big Ben thinks it's the complete opposite.
"In fact, I would contradict it a bit," Roethlisberger said. "I think a lot of No. 1 are guys in one place. … You can move guys by formations, but literally play a different position – he plays X, F, Z – JuJu can do anything and he is quite different in that sense because he can do it all.
"In truth, it's different from many of # 1."
All eyes will be on JuJu, especially when he goes deep.
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Kevin Gorman is a writer for Tribune-Review. You can contact Kevin by email at [email protected] or via Twitter .
