Pittsburgh Steelers: James Conner’s chances get better and better with each lash out

The Pittsburgh Steelers cannot be happy with the attitude of Le’Veon Bell, and with another attack at the organization and the fan base, the running back depth chart takes a different direction.

James Conner has to be sitting on his high horse watching the starting running back make a fool of himself in Pittsburgh. As Le’Veon Bell loses ground with the organization, Conner continues to become a more promising replacement, even if he’s not.

The expectations for Conner this season is to improve, but still be considered a power back. That means he’s not looked upon as the future starter, but more of a compliment back behind Bell and alongside Jaylen Samuels.

That’s changing, though. The more Bell continues to speak his mind and hurt his reputation in Pittsburgh, the more okay everyone gets in moving on from the running back.

Samuels may be more exciting right now, but Conner is the next man up, and his reps will prove in in 2018.

With Bell hurting his long-term chances, the team is going to try and develop their two younger runners. That means Bell’s rushes will decrease as the Steelers are looking to slowly move away from a future with him, and Conner will gain more first and second down reps.

Expectations for Bell in 2018 shouldn’t be 2,000 yards. Pittsburgh isn’t handing this man the ball 400 times trying to run him down to nothing. Instead, they’ll use the season to give Conner experience and work Samuels into a pass catching role.

This leaves Bell with more things to complain about, yes, but at this point, no one is really upset that he’s losing a workload. Now that he’s made the target on his back even larger (see what I did there) Pittsburgh’s primary objective it to use his final season on the team as a stepping stone for their next backs up.

Coming into the offseason this is not what many expected. Hopes were high that Bell would get a long-term deal, but the more he spoke to the media and posted on social media, the less people stayed on his side.

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Now, his time in Pittsburgh is expiring, and after 2018, he’ll be in a new uniform. Maybe they aren’t replacing him with the next best running back in the NFL, but James Conner has potential, and we’ll get to see that this season.