J. Samuels' role in '19

[STH70]

They have been talking about this kind of thing for several years now and I have never seen it used yet.

I also remember hearing talk of 2-back sets and have never seen it used, not even in the pre-season where they experiment with it.

With the departure of AB and Jesse James, it seems like the Steelers should be trying to figure out the WR and TE situations and getting them as many reps as possible in the pre-season instead of experimenting with 2-back sets.
Just my opinion.

[RuthlessBurgher]

Well, Jaylen Samuels can play a quasi-TE H-back type of role for us.

Although he does not have the size of a typical TE, I would trust Samuels more in that role than any of our other TE's not named Vance McDonald.

If we trotted out Conner, Samuels, McDonald, Juju, and Moncrief, for instance, the defense would look at that and immediately think 21 personnel (2 RB, 1 TE) when they see both 30 and 38 out there, and they would sub in players to best deal with that player grouping.

However, Samuels could then split out in an H-back role, giving up more of a 12 personnel look (1 RB, 2 TE) that might catch the defense off guard a bit after they make their substitutions.

[Oh wow]

They have been talking about this kind of thing for several years now and I have never seen it used yet.

Yup. I guess splitting Samuels could be a nice little wrinkle but I doubt we are going to see a bunch of 2 RB formations in the backfield.

Samuels isn’t a blocker.