5 players who would have been better picks for Steelers than Najee Harris

C Creed Humphrey

My final ranking: 27th overall

Just because the NFL was wrong for letting Creed Humphrey fall to the tail end of the second round doesn’t mean that the Steelers were right to pass him up (twice, in fact). I said at the time that Humphrey would have been a very solid pick in the first round. Now he’s already playing like the best center in football.

What wasn’t to like about Humphrey coming out of Oklahoma? At 6’4 1/4” and 302 pounds, Humphrey had great technique on tape and some of the best movement skills I had ever seen from an interior offensive lineman. His athletic testing would confirm this, as Humphrey tested as a 100th percentile athlete, via Relative Athletic Score.

At the Senior Bowl, Humphrey was nearly perfect. Despite one-on-one drills that favor the defensive line, Humphrey never lost a rep. This is something that should have elevated his draft status but apparently did not.

Despite the Steelers being desperate for a new starting center after the retirement of Maurkice Pouncey, Pittsburgh elected to wait until round three and dig down the list for Kendrick Green. So far. Green is also a great athlete but hasn’t shown the ability to hold up against stronger pass rushers and has been downright awful at times this year. Humphrey would have been a more important piece of the puzzle than Harris for the Steelers and could have had a 10-year career in Pittsburgh.