Steelers draft superlatives for an intriguing rookie class
By Andrew Falce
Most likely to succeed
And the winner of the most likely to succeed, or the potential boom prospect, is… Chase Claypool.
Steelers nation seems torn on Claypool as a prospect. While everyone can agree on his athletic ability and size (those traits compare favorably to a one Calvin Johnson), the finer details of his game come into question.
The biggest issue that comes up is his ability to separate, as many of his catches down the field came in heavily contested jump ball situations. While this can work at the college level, he will need to be able to better utilize his athleticism to gain separation. A lot of this comes down to the fact he can get bullied on the line upon takeoff, something that needs to be improved upon.
While he attributes to this problem, look at the QB play from Notre Dame last year. As highlighted here, Ian Book is a QB who struggles to push the ball deep, thus causing a lot of adjustment on the catch (leading to these contested catches). Playing with a gunslinger like Ben Roethlisberger, Claypool will be able to use his top-end speed will little thought of adjusting to the catch.
No, Claypool isn’t a WR like Megatron or a mismatch TE like Jimmy Graham once was, but if he reaches his ceiling, he should be a dominant WR. I would say his ceiling is close to Mike Evans, a big athletic target that can win deep and dominate in the red zone. All in all, he is the most likely to succeed.