With blindfold off, Terrell Edmunds set for 2nd season with Steelers
For an NFL rookie, training camp has been compared to being blindfolded. When it is removed, wide-eyed players can require an adjustment to bright lights.
Before Terrell Edmunds could get settled last summer, the 2018 first-round pick was starting at strong safety for the Pittsburgh Steelers. By comparison, he feels like a seasoned veteran at his second training camp.
“Everything is a learning process, so last year I was coming in and learning a new system, learning how (Mike Tomlin) coaches and adjusting to the way he coaches and adjusting to the NFL at the same time,” Edmunds said. “You’ve just got to keep on working. Now that I’ve got that under my belt and have that experience of going on the field and making those good plays and those bad plays, it just comes easier.”
Edmunds isn’t just carrying himself with more confidence through the first four practices at Saint Vincent. He believes he will be a different player this season at Heinz Field.
“Really, it’s just now you know what to expect,” Edmunds said. “You’ve been through it. You know the playbook better. It’s not so much a process of learning and playing. It’s more that you react to what you see, so now I’m just going out there and playing.”
Tomlin said he expects second-year players to make a dramatic jump in consistency and performance, given they have had a year to adapt to the NFL lifestyle, practice schedule and mental and physical demands of playing professional football.
“This is not their first lap around the track,” Tomlin said. “From an assignment standpoint, they got a better understanding of what they’re being asked to do. They’re not learning for the first time. They got a sense from a conditioning standpoint the rigors of this process, so they come into it with more trained professional bodies.”
That philosophy applies even more to Edmunds, who was thrust into a starting role when Morgan Burnett injured his hamstring in camp last July. Including special teams, Edmunds played the most snaps of any Steelers player (1,189) last season and the second most on defense (966) behind free safety Sean Davis.
What impressed Tomlin was not just that durability but the how “highly conditioned” Edmunds keeps his 6-foot-1, 217-pound frame, which caused Cameron Heyward to dub Edmunds “No body fat Rell” in a tweet this weekend.
“He’s highly conditioned. I think that was the one thing we learned about him, and that was a unique thing for a guy in his position,” Tomlin said. “To be able to play the number of snaps he was able to play and have that level of availability was a unique thing then. It is reasonable to expect that to be a unique springboard to him ascending continually.”
Edmunds started 15 games and tied with linebacker Jon Bostic for third on the team with 73 tackles — including seven or more tackles in six games — but showed room for growth. Edmunds had one interception (at Tampa Bay), one fumble recovery (against Baltimore) and one sack (against the L.A. Chargers).
“I’ve just got to keep doing what I’ve been doing and play the game that I know how to play, just ‘do me,’ you could say,” Edmunds said. “It’s going to come with time. The more plays you get under your belt, the more experiences you’ve put yourself into, the more stuff that you can do.
“You’ve got to keep on progressing from season to season. I can’t be the same guy as last year because that would be a down year for me, I’d say.”
Now, with no blindfold, Edmunds doesn’t see that happening.
Kevin Gorman is a TribLive reporter covering the Pirates. A Baldwin native and Penn State graduate, he joined the Trib in 1999 and has covered high school sports, Pitt football and basketball and was a sports columnist for 10 years. He can be reached at kgorman@triblive.com.
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