Steelers DT Cam Heyward Talks Patriots, Falcons & More with Rich

Cam Heyward joined the show 1-0, fresh off a Pittsburgh win over Atlanta, and immediately had to answer for his media career. Not Just Football with Cam Heyward has apparently escaped the sports section entirely, with People and US Weekly picking it up.

"I didn't think People magazine and US Weekly would be featuring me that way," Heyward said.

The guest on this week's episode is T.J. Watt, which is convenient, because Rich wanted to start there anyway.

Watt's pick six was the play that decided the game, and Heyward's first reaction to it was practical rather than poetic.

"I'm glad he scored, because if you all know, when I play, right after I have to go to field goal. So I'm like, all right, I don't need to run anymore. You got a clear lane, you handle that."

The catch itself did not surprise him. Watt was a quarterback in high school, and Heyward gives him plenty of grief about that, but he was also a very good tight end. Those hands run in the family, since J.J. has always been good at catching balls at the line of scrimmage too.

"It's something in that Wisconsin water. They got the goods over there."

Rich wanted to know whether it was film study, some tell on a certain down and distance from Cooper Rush. Heyward credited instincts, plus a circumstance that helps.

Pittsburgh was facing Atlanta's third quarterback, which means the reads slow down. Nobody is rushing through progressions. That gives a defensive line time to get hands up when the quarterback loads up to throw.

"I had some bad balls, but T.J. took it a step further and just caught the ball, had the wherewithal to get up and score."

Then he reached for the right comparison, and it was not Remember the Titans.

"Do you remember The Replacements? Remember when the sumo wrestler gets the ball in his hands and they create a convoy for him? They're like, follow us. That's what it felt like once T.J. caught it."

Rich pushed the casting further, asking whether that makes Rodgers the Keanu Reeves and the head coach the Gene Hackman. Heyward took both.

"I think Rodgers would thrive as the Keanu Reeves. And I think Coach Mike's got some good Gene Hackman in him."

That led to the part of the conversation Heyward clearly cared most about. This was Mike McCarthy's first win as head coach of the Steelers, in his hometown job.

"I think he was a little bit emotional," Heyward said. "It's always been his dream to be the Pittsburgh Steelers head coach, and that win is going to mean a lot. I think every player knew that."

He described the weight of a first game for any coaching staff, all the thinking that goes into it, all the plans a league full of coaches announce in the spring. Stack the dream job on top of that and it becomes something else entirely.

"We were happy to get that win for him, and hopefully we can deliver a lot more game balls to him."

New England is next, and Heyward watched that Wednesday night game closely, though his viewing experience was compromised by a fantasy football disaster. He had TreVeyon Henderson on his roster, Henderson did not play, and Heyward forgot to take him out of the starting lineup and lost because of it.

"I'm not used to Wednesday football."

Rich pointed out that Heyward plays in a league where people are drafting the Steelers defense second overall, so he should be able to win it in his sleep. The bigger problem, Heyward admitted, is that his current co-manager is his son, whose entire contribution is asking whether they won or lost. TJ volunteered to text him lineup advice during the week, no password required.

On the actual football, Heyward's read on the Patriots was respectful and specific.

It was a tight game for a long stretch. A.J. Brown went down and New England kept battling. They were without Henderson and still ran the ball with success. The defense played very well. Turnovers changed the outcome, but the effort never wavered.

What stood out most was the context.

"I've been a part of watching a team get crowned and get their rings. There's a lot of emotion," Heyward said. "But to let that go down to the last drive says a lot. You can take the Super Bowl champs down to the wire. So we got our hands full."

He went through the personnel like a man who has already watched the tape twice. Drake Maye runs it and throws it. The secondary is opportunistic. There are rushers up front like Milton who know how to get home. Gonzalez is in the back making timely plays, which is exactly what fueled that playoff run.

Rich asked the sharper question. How do you game plan against a quarterback with a known ball protection issue when you are the guy who can wreck his timing?

Heyward's answer was more disciplined than the premise.

"We go in saying we know there's a known issue, but it's an issue only if we make it an issue."

His reasoning is that a quarterback coming off turnovers will try to autocorrect and overprotect the ball, which means the pressure has to be structural rather than opportunistic. Stop the run early on first and second down. Control the play action. And account for the fact that New England boots both directions, unlike most teams that boot right for a right handed quarterback.

"It's really important for us to get off the bus and really dominate up front."

The last time Pittsburgh played them, early in a season, the Steelers forced a pile of turnovers and won because of it. Heyward does not want that filed as a coincidence.

Rich then asked him to solve a problem the media created for itself. How much do Week 1 results actually mean?

"September is important, but it's not everything."

Heyward's view is that people jump on bandwagons early because one team blows out another. Winning games in September does pay off later. It is not an indicator that anybody is winning a Super Bowl. There is a lot of luck involved, and injuries are an enormous factor.

He pointed to the San Francisco and Los Angeles game as an example of something structurally strange, with a team crossing the world to play a divisional game.

His real point is about seeding rather than narrative.

"I look at these conference games early on, it's all playoff seating. We play a team like New England this early, you have to know the magnitude, because this could be the difference between you playing at home or playing on the road."

Rich offered to cross a 17-0 Steelers season off his take list. Heyward countered that the show had never put Pittsburgh in the playoffs to begin with, which Chris confirmed on the spot before announcing he is changing his mind.

The scouting report on his own teammates was more fun. Heyward has been giving Darnell Washington grief about the fro he is currently wearing, telling him he looks like he could be part of the Jackson family, then watched him slam a defender to the ground.

"You look like you're part of a show, because you do that on cue week in and week out."

Rich wanted his actual weight, noting the roster lists him at 264 and that this cannot possibly be true. Heyward is not allowed to disclose it, but he was willing to play Price Is Right.

"If you bid lower, you are crazy."

Mike Tomlin's new media life came up too, and Heyward is enjoying it enormously. Tomlin has been making the point that defenders spend all spring and summer under orders to stay away from the quarterback, then have to flip a switch in Week 1, which is part of why offenses are ahead of defenses.

"He was preaching that left and right and I'm so mad at him," Heyward said. "I would love to have sacked Ben a little bit more times in practice."

He does think it is true, especially since the roughing the passer emphasis arrived. It is hard to practice taking a quarterback down when you will never put your own quarterback in harm's way.

Then there was Tomlin's line over Browns and Jaguars highlights that were entirely Jaguars: in the words of my friend JuJu Smith-Schuster, the Browns is the Browns.

"It's so funny to hear Mike T just quoting other Steelers and going on these tangents," Heyward said. "He has just been waiting to have this open forum. As many times as he would tell us to just shut up, now he's able to go out there and say what he wants."

Rich tried to turn it into bulletin board material, given that Pittsburgh sees Cleveland in two weeks on a Thursday night. Heyward declined.

"It's not bulletin board material. We still got to play. A lot is said, but the plays are the plays, and we got to go out there and dominate."

The segment ended on a bruise. Rich asked whether Bijan Robinson said anything before the game about the night before in Texas, where Ohio State blew a 20 point lead.

Heyward complimented Robinson's acting work on Outer Banks instead. On the game, he was less composed.

"I actually texted Kevin Durant today and I was like, you probably enjoyed that more than anybody," Heyward said. "I thought we had it in the bag at 23 to three."

Rich confirmed the score, and the margin, with some relish.

"I can't wait till we play this year," Heyward said.