Artie Burns and Joe Haden don’t believe the Pittsburgh Steelers have a clear-cut No. 1 cornerback.
The two feel they share that role.
Haden has been a top cornerback in the league throughout his career and Burns Baker Mayfield Jersey , a 2016 first-round pick, feels like he’s starting to come into his own as he enters his third season. The two hope a full offseason and training camp together can help a young group of Steelers defensive backs regain some swagger.
”Right now, I’m just trying to show him the way I go about my business,” Haden said. ”Training camp is one of the biggest spots where we can see growth and we can see what the offseason did.”
Haden spent his first seven pro seasons in Cleveland. He feels an entire spring of organized team activities and minicamp with Burns and the Steelers will only prove beneficial as the team works through training camp and the preseason.
”I’m trying to understand the whole defense, not just the corners and safety, but also the linebackers and defensive linemen,” Haden said. ”I’m just trying to get the whole system from the ground up and get an overall grasp of the defense.”
Cleveland released Haden on the eve of the 2017 regular season and the Steelers immediately acted. They quickly signed the two-time Pro Bowl cornerback with the hope he could give a young secondary an instant jolt.
”Having a veteran guy in your room that got to the level everybody wants to get to,” Burns said, ”you kind of sit back and think that you can learn from him to get to that point.”
The Steelers did just that last season.
Pittsburgh ranked 16th against the pass in 2016, but Haden provided a necessary boost as the Steelers ended fifth in passing yards allowed. A 45-point outburst by Jacksonville in the AFC divisional playoff marred an otherwise strong season.
”I think the communication was the biggest thing for us Josh Jackson Packers Jersey , just no blown coverages,” Haden said. ”In the Jacksonville game, there were a couple times where people were just running free. We have the ability, we have the players, we just have to be on the same page and make sure everybody’s covering their man.”
That has been the focus for Burns. He has carried a noticeably different, more confident swagger during training camp practices. He’s still locked into regular one-on-one practice battles with four-time All-Pro wide receiver Antonio Brown, a daily matchup Burns welcomes.
”Ever since I got here it’s been a battle with (Brown),” Burns said. ”It’s just something I expect from myself. I don’t even request it. I just step up, we go at it and go to work.”
It has already paid off for the third-year cornerback.
Burns jumped Brown’s slant route during the team’s first padded practice and picked off Landry Jones’s pass in the end zone. He also jumped a Ben Roethlisberger pass and came up with an interception that would’ve been returned for a touchdown.
Burns said that sort of intuition comes with experience.
”You can feel the speed of the receiver,” Burns said. ”A play can only go for so long Cheap Josh Jackson Jersey , so once you figure out the timing of it, that’s when you have a chance to make a play on the ball.”
Burns seeks similar game-changing plays alongside Haden in the secondary this season.
”(Haden) is helping us in certain situations that he has already been put in before,” Burns said. ”That’s what Joe is doing for us.”
NOTES: Coach Mike Tomlin said Brown was sent to Pittsburgh to be evaluated for a ”minor, day-to-day” injury. Brown missed the previous two practices with his undisclosed injury. Tomlin wouldn’t say what sort of injury. … S Morgan Burnett (hamstring), Sean Davis (groin), T.J. Watt (hamstring), Vance McDonald (foot) and Alejandro Villanueva (undisclosed) also missed practice on Thursday.
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Toronto Raptors President Masai Ujiri hasn’t forgotten the first time he met Nick Nurse.
It was 1995 and Ujiri, now president of the Toronto Raptors, was playing for the Derby Storm of the British Basketball League. Nurse was coach of the rival Birmingham Bullets. Not yet 30, Nurse had already been on the bench for six years Michael Gallup Jersey , quickly establishing himself as a coach on the rise.
”His teams were tough,” Ujiri said Thursday as the Raptors officially introduced Nurse as their coach. ”There was always something about the Birmingham team that was different from the whole league. People talked about them that way.”
More than two decades on from that initial introduction, Ujiri is hoping Nurse has what it takes to turn Toronto into the talk of the NBA.
The ninth head coach in Raptors history, Nurse replaces his former boss, Dwane Casey – under whom he spent the past five seasons as a Toronto assistant. Casey was fired after the Raptors were swept out of the second round of this year’s playoffs by Cleveland, their third straight playoff defeat at the hands of LeBron James and the Cavs.
Ujiri called Nurse ”everything you want in a candidate” and said his new coach, the first he has hired as an NBA executive, is someone who ”thinks the game differently.”
”He was outstanding,” Ujiri said. ”He really came out on top. Trying new stuff, being innovative Cheap Quenton Nelson Jersey , is who Nick is. You can tell he’s a tactician who really thinks the game.”
Nurse called it ”a long month” of waiting for a decision following Casey’s dismissal but said he understood why Ujiri needed to take his time.
”Even though I’ve been across the gym from him for five years, there’s a lot of detail to go through,” Nurse said.
Nurse also gave credit to Casey, who was hired as Detroit’s head coach this week.
”We shared a lot of winning together,” Nurse said. ”He’s a competitive guy, a great professional. I learned a lot from him. You can’t take away the five years we shared.”
Toronto went 59-23 this season, the best record in the Eastern Conference and second-best in the NBA behind Houston. Nurse was in charge of the offense, led by All-Star guards DeMar DeRozan and Kyle Lowry. He also engineered a successful overhaul of the game plan before last season as Toronto put increased emphasis on ball movement and 3-point shooting.
For the coming season, Nurse said he wants to inject more defensive creativity ”so we can try to be ready for more things in the playoffs.”
Rex Kalamian, a Raptors assistant alongside Nurse last season James Washington Game Jersey , is expected to join the Los Angeles Clippers, leaving Nurse multiple spots to fill on his staff. Nurse said Thursday he has a good idea of what he’s looking for.
”I think it’s really important that we get an experienced staff,” he said. ”Guys that have been head coaches at some level is important to me. It’s good to know what it’s like to be the decision maker.”
There’s also the possibility of new players, with Ujiri acknowledging Toronto has ”work to do” with its roster.
Nurse graduated from Northern Iowa and got his first head coaching position at Grand View College when he was only 23. He spent more than a decade in Europe and was an assistant coach for Britain at the 2012 London Olympics. A past G League coach of the year, he’s the only coach to lead two teams to an NBA G League Championship, winning with Iowa in 2011 and Rio Grande in 2013.
Nurse’s career has seen its share of stops and opponents, but he still recalls facing Ujiri while with Birmingham.
”I remember,” Nurse said, smiling. ”He played really hard.”
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