AFC Notes: Browns, Ravens, Steelers

Browns

• Sports Illustrated’s Albert Breer highlights Browns second-round LB Jeremiah Owusu-Koramoah and third-round WR Anthony Schwartz as two rookies who have impressed the coaching staff during OTAs with their speed.
• They also thought Owusu-Koramoah had the frame to add more weight and Schwartz showed better polish at the top of his routes than anticipated.

Ravens

• The Athletic’s Jeff Zrebiec provides a laundry list of reasons why the Ravens don’t make sense as a legitimate trading partner for the Falcons and WR Julio Jones. He confirms Baltimore inquired with Atlanta before the draft but the asking price along with Jones’ contract and the Ravens’ limited cap flexibility pretty much scuttled a deal. 
• Since then, the Ravens also drafted Rashod Bateman and Tylan Wallace and spent a chunk of cap space on OT Alejandro Villanueva. Zrebiec points out the Ravens are higher than outsiders on their receiving corps, and while Jones is clearly better, adding him would mean losing developmental snaps for a number of those players. 
• Zrebiec adds draft picks are important to the Ravens given how many big contracts they’re looking at giving out in the next year or so and sending one to the Falcons for Jones while also adding his deal to their books would mean they’d have to let some of those younger players go. It would also nuke their flexibility to make other additions, like a veteran pass rusher. 
• Zrebiec notes the report that the Bengals and Steelers were interested in DE Ryan Kerrigan before he signed with the Eagles shows the Ravens have competition for adding a player like Justin Houston or Melvin Ingram. 
• While Eagles TE Zach Ertz might make some sense for the Ravens in a trade or if Philadelphia releases him, Zrebiec suspects it will be more of a “right player, right price” situation for Baltimore, meaning there will be interest but only if other teams don’t drive the price up too much. 
• Zrebiec thinks former Washington RT Morgan Moses also falls in that category for the Ravens.

Steelers

Steelers’ DE Cameron Heyward says that Pittsburgh is happy to have rookie RB Najee Harris in the fold for the upcoming season.

“I think as a defender, we’re most excited to have him,” Heyward said of Harris on NFL Network’s Good Morning Football. “Having a guy like that that can tote the rock 30 to 40 times a game really puts an ease for the defense. He can do multiple things. I think the investment in our offense this offseason has been huge.”

Heyward also commented on Pittsburgh’s struggles during the season, which culminated in their elimination from the postseason by the Cleveland Browns.

“I think we lost a lot of gas as we went down that stretch,” Heyward said. “I think our balance between our offense and defense wasn’t great. We weren’t getting off the field as much we were earlier in the season, and then our offense couldn’t sustain drives. You compound all that together, and it wasn’t a great success. Going forward, I think we can continue to keep growing.”

Heyward hasn’t played a season with the Steelers where QB Ben Roethlisberger was not on the roster. Heyward says he and his teammates still believe in him as his career is almost certainly coming to a close.

“We know he’s an explosive quarterback that can throw the ball all over the field,” Heyward said of Roethlisberger. “But I think around (him), we’ve just got to be complementary, whether it’s on offense, defense, special teams. Ben’s still got the goods. Anyone that tells you otherwise, they haven’t really looked at football. You give that guy a good running game and tell him he doesn’t have to throw the ball 50, 60 times, he’s going to be that much more dangerous, and I think we’re looking forward to that. It’s going to be pretty good longevity-wise if he wants to keep playing.”