Dwayne Haskins shows improvement for Pittsburgh Steelers

Former first-round pick Dwayne Haskins has a chance to revive his career with the Pittsburgh Steelers. He showed improvement in his second appearance.

The Pittsburgh Steelers are not yet in life after Ben Roethlisberger, but that day could be coming soon. If it does, they may have an option in-house with Dwayne Haskins, a former first-round pick out of Ohio State.

The Washington Football Team selected Haskins in the first round of the 2019 NFL Draft after his breakout season in 2018 with Ohio State. Although the sample size from Haskins as a Buckeye was rather small, he was so dominant in 2018 that the entire NFL took notice.

Even after a number of QB-needy teams passed on Haskins in that particular draft, Washington took him and the early returns were not great. Washington also overhauled its coaching staff, leaving Haskins in the middle of a pretty brutal situation overall.

Haskins was stripped of his team captain status last season in Washington after he deliberately violated the league and team COVID protocol by attending a party maskless. He was benched in favor of Taylor Heinicke and ultimately released after what was ultimately just a flat-out disaster of a situation in Washington.

Not only was Haskins cut by the team that had drafted him just one year prior, but he also went unclaimed on the waiver wire despite his first-round status.

The Pittsburgh Steelers would ultimately be the team that would give Dwayne Haskins another chance, and they signed him to a reserve/futures contract in the 2021 offseason.

That has led to some actual progression on the field for Haskins, which Pittsburgh media have taken notice of in practices.

The Steelers played in the Hall of Fame game where Dwayne Haskins got his first shot to get back onto the football field. He mostly played it safe in that game but in the Steelers’ second preseason game, he was feeling it a bit.

He finished the game completing 16-of-22 passes with a touchdown and no interceptions, and Haskins looked a lot more comfortable out there than we have seen him in the past couple of seasons.

It’s undoubtedly a much better atmosphere for him in Pittsburgh than it was with Washington. Although Haskins certainly played his part on and off the field in a quick exit from Washington, there were also things the team could have done a lot differently to support a first-round quarterback.

It looks like, through two games, Pittsburgh is really asking Dwayne Haskins to go out there and read the coverage pre-snap, and then make a rather quick decision with the ball once he does snap it. He’s not out there taking a ton of deep drops or holding onto the ball for a long time.

Identifying the right matchup in man coverage, knowing where to find the void in zone coverage, get the ball to your back on time and at a place where he can make a play after the catch…Those seem to be the primary things the Steelers are having Haskins work on early in preseason play, but he’s also showing a willingness to try and get outside the pocket and make some plays.

Some of those attempts have been more successful than others, but overall, he looks confident even if his accuracy on the move hasn’t been exactly where it needs to be.

As the preseason progresses, it will be great to see Haskins taking some more downfield shots, deeper drops, and seeing more of what he can do when scanning the whole field post-snap.

At this point though, the Pittsburgh Steelers and their fans should be pleased with what Dwayne Haskins is showing in the early stages of preseason play.