2021 Summer Sleeper: Pittsburgh Steelers
In our annual 32-part Summer Sleeper series, DLF scribes identify a lightly-touted player on each NFL roster who may be worthy of your consideration. Our subjects all have varying levels of “sleeperness,” but each merits a bit of in-depth discussion here in the Premium Content section.
To help everybody along, we are going to be categorizing our sleepers under one of three headings:
- Super Deep Sleepers – Players who aren’t roster-worthy in 12-team leagues, but are still worth keeping an eye on.
- Deep Sleepers – An end-of-the-roster player who is more often than not on the waiver wire in 12-team leagues.
- Sleeper – A likely rostered player who makes for a good trade target. Their startup ADP puts them out of the top 175 or so.
Because we aren’t going to give you mainstream sleepers, most of these players will undoubtedly fizzle. All we are asking is for you to keep an open mind and perhaps be willing to make room for one of these players on your bench. You never know when the next James Robinson is going to spring up. Feel free to add your own thoughts about our choice for the designated sleeper, or nominate one of your own in the comments below.
The 2020 Pittsburgh Steelers won 12 games and another AFC North division title. Their defense ranked near the top of the league while the offense was 12th in points scored and a surprisingly low 24th in total yards.
However, do not confuse this team with the division rival Baltimore Ravens. The Steelers air it out with Ben Roethlisberger. For the second straight year with a healthy Big Ben (recall he missed 14 games in 2019), they led the NFL in pass attempts, this time with a hearty 41.0 per game. And as the 38-year-old quarterback gets older, his wide receivers stay the same age.
The Steelers’ top three wide receivers are all between 23 and 25 years old. Interestingly, they all place within seven spots of each other in DLF’s Superflex ADP. Add first-round running back Najee Harris to the mix and it is fair to question how another pass-catcher could succeed in this offense. That leads us to the subject of this piece.
Pat Freiermuth, TE
Category: Sleeper
Before Kyle Pitts took the dynasty world by storm, former Penn State tight end Freiermuth caused a stir of his own to the point of earning the nickname “Baby Gronk.”
It is for good reason. His profile metrics suggest a high-quality prospect. For example, he surpassed a key production threshold, college market share, as a 19-year-old sophomore.
The DLF College Market Share App.
This and his breakout age of 19.9 years put him in the top quartile of historical tight end prospects. At 6’5” and 251 pounds he is not a blazer, as evidenced by his 4.95-second 40-yard dash, but his agility numbers make up for it, and his second-round NFL Draft capital is a reassuring cap to his resume. He is a quality prospect with strong draft capital on a successful franchise with high passing volume.
But as noted, the other young talent is gobbling up much of that volume. The receiving trio of Diontae Johnson, JuJu Smith-Schuster, and Chase Claypool, listed in order of 2020 targets, saw 58% of Roethlisberger’s passes. They all had 100 or more targets. That still left a hefty 275 targets for the rest of the team. The bad news for Freiermuth is fellow tight end Eric Ebron took 91 of those. The good news? Ebron is an unrestricted free agent after this season, clearing a path for Freiermuth to become the Steelers TE1 in short order.
Meanwhile, the Steelers are racing the clock with the 38-year-old Roethlisberger, who looks unlikely to have the longevity of a Tom Brady. Neither of his 25-year-old backups, Mason Rudolph and Joshua Dobbs, appear to be the answer. But a mitigant here is the quality of the Steelers organization. Their front office is more than capable of securing a quality quarterback upon Roethlisberger’s retirement.
Another near-term challenge for Freiermuth could be fellow rookie and first-round pick Najee Harris. The 2020 Steelers had the fifth-fewest carries in the league. Who can blame them? The tandem of James Conner and Benny Snell broke just 12 tackles on 224 rushing attempts and averaged just 2.5 yards after contact per rush. Harris should be an immediate upgrade and could prompt the team to run more. In favorable game script situations, a 12-win team probably should close out games by running the ball and leaning on an elite defense.
Despite these questions, Freiermuth looks like a nice value. His ADP has inexplicably dropped roughly three startup rounds to an all-time low since its March peak.
While he had a Superflex Rookie ADP of 2.12 during rookie draft season, the DLF Dynasty Trade Analyzer, which derives its values from ADP, DLF rankings and real-world MyFantasyLeague data, puts his value in line with a 2021 late third or early fourth-round rookie pick. He is a sleeper target at a discount.
The DLF Dynasty Trade Analyzer
In Superflex Startup ADP he is going in about the 16th round as TE22. This puts him in the neighborhood of tight ends such as Anthony Firkser, Blake Jarwin, and Austin Hooper. Other rookies in this area include Chuba Hubbard, Kenneth Gainwell, and Amari Rodgers.
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