Pittsburgh Steelers: 3 Early breakout candidates for 2019 season
1. James Washington, WR
With Antonio Brown now suiting up in the silver and black, the Pittsburgh Steelers are almost surely going to see JuJu Smith-Schuster emerge as a bonafide star in the NFL. Entering his third season since being a second-round selection in 2017, Smith-Schuster has already been a productive force on offense, so a bigger role only likely means bigger things for him in terms of his output.
However, one of the benefits that Smith-Schuster had in his first two NFL seasons was clearly working with Brown in the receiving corps. Due to that, it stands the reason that Ben Roethlisberger and the Steelers offense will need more weapons to emerge to help out Smith-Schuster and the group as a whole. Enter, James Washington.
The 2018 second-round pick (60th overall) out of Oklahoma State, Washington was targeted just 38 times as a rookie and amassed just 16 catches for 217 yards and one touchdown. Having said that, he was largely just a one-trick pony — by design — in the Steelers offense last season. With Brown gone, he’ll be asked to play a much bigger role.
Next. Grading each NFL team's 2019 offseason. dark
While Washington does not seemingly check the boxes of a superstar, there is no denying the talent he put on display while at Oklahoma State throughout his collegiate career. Thus, you can expect that Washington will not only see many more balls thrown his way in the 2019 season, but also that his statistical production will make a huge jump as well as the No. 2 option in the passing offense.