Zach Frazier given Joe Greene Award as Steelers rookie of the year

When the Pittsburgh Steelers selected Zach Frazier with the 51st overall pick of April’s draft, it marked the highest the team had selected a center since Maurkice Pouncey 14 years prior.

Tuesday, Frazier joined Pouncey as a Steelers rookie of the year. He can only hope to follow by matching Pouncey’s lengthy and decorated career.

“I’m just focused on how I can be the best every day,” Frazier said after accepting the 2024 Joe Greene Great Performance Award, given annually to the Steelers’ top rookie. “I don’t really like to look ahead. I just take everything day by day, practice by practice. I feel like if you look ahead at those things, you can get off track. So I try not to look at it.”

Frazier, the Steelers’ second-round pick from West Virginia, was a near-unanimous choice as rookie of the year in balloting by the Pittsburgh chapter of the Pro Football Writers of America. Frazier started the opener of his rookie season and, aside from an ankle injury that cost him 2 1/2 October games, played every snap at the center of the offensive line.

Frazier was running with the second team through three weeks of training camp until veteran Nate Herbig suffered what would be a season-ending shoulder injury in mid-August.

Frazier took over the role as the starting center — one he likely was going to ascend to sooner rather than later anyway — and never looked back. Saturday in the regular-season finale, Frazier will make his 15th start. That’s the most by a Steelers rookie since running back Najee Harris made 17 in 2021.

“It’s flown by, honestly. It’s gone by fast,” Fraizer said of his rookie season. “I feel like I’ve learned a lot. I’m just trying to build week by week, get better every week and just focus on how I can get better and how I can make our team better and stuff like that.”

Frazier was one of three offensive linemen the Steelers took over the first four rounds of this year’s draft. All started at some point, and it’s likely all three would be starting in the playoffs if not for a knee injury suffered by first-round tackle Troy Fautanu that has him on injured reserve.

But Frazier and right guard Mason McCormick — a fourth-round pick out of South Dakota State — have played next to each other for every Steelers offensive snap of the past eight games.

“I’ve been really pleased with their performance and their ability to grow in the midst of accumulation of a lot of snaps, but they bring a unique background,” Steelers coach Mike Tomlin said. “Mason McCormick has been a part of (FCS) national championships. He’s played 15 or 16 games in the college season. Zach Frazier is as experienced as a rookie can be in terms of starting and playing in a Power Five conference. And so I think that, although I’ve been pleased with their ability to sustain, I don’t know that I’m surprised by given what I just outlined for you, particularly regarding those two.”

Frazier made 46 starts over four seasons at WVU, serving as a team captain for three. A four-time West Virginia state high school heavyweight wrestling champion, Frazier was the third center drafted this year. And while Jackson Powers-Johnson (Las Vegas Raiders) and Graham Barton (Tampa Bay Buccaneers) also became starters as rookies, Frazier, during the draft process, was considered a plug-and-play NFL center.

That generally proved accurate.

“A couple games in, it just started to click,” Fraizer said. “Just overall, being more comfortable with the playbook, making calls, seeing and reading defenses. At first, I had to kind of think. Now I’m just out there playing football again. It’s a lot less thinking for me.”