Film Room: Evaluating The Good And Bad Of Jack Sawyer’s First Preseason

Very few played as many snaps for the Pittsburgh Steelers in the preseason than rookie OLB Jack Sawyer. With T.J. Watt and Alex Highsmith sitting out and Nick Herbig playing only a handful of snaps, Sawyer had an extended opportunity to show what kind of rotational player he can be off the bench this season. There were some ups and downs to his play, but it’s a strong foundation for him to build on moving forward in his career.

In three games, Sawyer had eight tackles, two tackles for loss, and two QB hits. That isn’t the best production given how much he played. Our Alex Kozora wrote a column in defense of Sawyer on Sunday, and I wanted to follow it up with a more extensive film room of his play.

Today I will show several examples from all three games to highlight what he’s doing well and where he could stand to improve.

One of the first things that stuck out to me with Sawyer was his high motor. It doesn’t matter if it was the first quarter or the fourth, he did a great job of rallying to the football until the whistle was blown. Here are a few examples of Sawyer being out of the play but hustling to get in on a tackle.

You never know when a ball carrier will make somebody miss. Swarming to the football prevents fluky explosive plays and protects against the occasional poor tackling from teammates. It also increases the chance of a splash play as Sawyer can punch out the ball from an unsuspecting ball carrier or provide an extra body to dive on a fumble if the ball hits the turf in front of him.

So far, his default pass-rush move has been a chop/rip or swipe/rip move. He doesn’t vary his moves much at the moment, preferring to use speed and hand technique to try to get around the edge. He does a nice job in general, but the lack of variety and counters gets him in trouble at times.

Here is what it looks like when things go well. He chops the punch away and rips around the edge with nice bend to hit the QB. It should have been a sack if not for a miraculous dump-off pass.

Other times he will just get pushed up the arc and past the play entirely. On the second clip below, Saywer didn’t even make it that far and got thrown out of the club with no counter moves to speak of.

Sawyer didn’t employ power moves that often and could benefit from using them more. The couple times he did, he was able to generate some push to help squeeze the pocket. Using the bull rush or long arm will also help set up his other moves so it isn’t so predictable when he wants to go around the edge.

When Sawyer doesn’t have a chance at a sack, he generally does a nice job getting his hands up in throwing lanes. It didn’t result in a batted pass in the preseason, but they will come for him.

There is some good and some bad on this play. He quickly beat the chip and found a path to the quarterback before getting his hands up in throwing lanes. But a few times on his film, he loses his outside assignment. Faster quarterbacks are going to tuck and run on this as Jack Sawyer completely vacated the outside.

In run defense, Sawyer overall does a great job at beating blocks. He can win with finesse and with power. The first two plays of the clip below show a great inside swim move and a long arm to get inside and make tackles for loss. Those are calculated risks as they create bounce lanes to the outside, but he did a great job here.

Barring injury, Jack Sawyer won’t be asked to play much outside linebacker this season outside of a handful of snaps per game. But he looks ready to contribute when needed based on his 100 defensive snaps in the preseason. His fundamentals are strong, but he will need to vary his pass-rush moves more to win on a consistent basis. He will also need to be very careful against players like Lamar Jackson, who will exploit his lack of lane discipline.