What a season to be a Steelers rookie wide receiver. Not Hines Ward, not Antonio Brown, not Louis Lipps, or even John Stallworth have had undefeated seasons as rookies 10 weeks in.
What’s almost as impressive is Chase Claypool’s quarterback is putting up big numbers, especially for a guy coming off major elbow surgery.
In case you’ve been living under a rock, Ben Roethlisberger was quarantined all week leading up to their Week 10 matchup. He was unable to practice with the team until being activated before the Saturday walk-through.
For a receiving group that needs as many reps with Big Ben as it can get, everyone speculated what the offense would look like this week after taking first-team reps with Mason Rudolph.
"He tells us what to do and it always works out," rookie Chase Claypool says of Ben Roethlisberger. As always, thank you for the time, @ChaseClaypool. #Steelers pic.twitter.com/Iq1StUzMCB
— Aditi Kinkhabwala (@AKinkhabwala) November 16, 2020
“Ben’s been around long enough that he can miss a week of practice, and he’ll be just fine,” Claypool said in a post-game interview with NFL Network’s Aditi Kinkhabwala. “It was up to us to take care of the little things.”
Claypool says that Big Ben always has something new up his sleeve, calling plays that they had never run before. He added that Sunday’s game was just another example of Roethlisberger drawing up plays in the dirt and says both of his touchdowns resulted from it. “He just tells me a route to run, and I’ll run it, and the ball’s there,” said Claypool.
Chase also feels the Steelers left a lot on the table and points to himself on a missed downfield shot. “I think there’s a lot left to be had, but we’ve got to keep building every week.”
The rookie doesn’t yet know what it’s like to lose in the NFL but says the key to winning is all about the mindset. “[We have] a week-to-week mindset,” said Claypool. “We can’t take any teams for granted. Dallas came out firing, and we learned our lesson from last week, and we came out firing ourselves this week.”
