Do Steelers Have another WR Draft Gem in Chase Claypool?

Have the Steelers done it again?

The team that has become noteworthy over the last decade for being able to find talented wide receivers just about anywhere in the NFL Draft might have just one-upped the competition once again.

The Steelers drafted wide receiver Chase Claypool with the 49th overall selection in the 2020 NFL Draft, and he was the 11th wide receiver taken off the board.

So far, he’s out-performed nearly all of them. Claypool scored four touchdowns in the Steelers’ Week 5 win over the Philadelphia Eagles, three of them through the air and one on the ground.

Claypool’s four reviling touchdowns on the season leads all rookies, and he’s the only player with more than two. He is fourth in receiving yards and seventh in receptions, and all of that comes despite Claypool entering the season No. 4 on the Steelers depth chart at wide receiver.

“Something like this you can never predict but you know, you always go into the end of the game thinking that you’re gonna have a really big game and you kind of have to keep that mindset throughout the season,” Claypool said after his four-score game. “But I would never predicted this. That was awesome.”

Here’s the wide receivers drafted in the first two rounds this April and how each of them have done so far.

No. 12 LVR Henry Ruggs (6-177-1)
No. 15 DEN Jerry Jeudy (15-234-1)
No. 17 DAL CeeDee Lamb (29–433-2)
No. 21 PHI Jalen Reagor (5-96-0)
No. 22 MIN Justin Jefferson (19-371-1)
No. 25 SFO Brandon Aiyuk (12-153-0)

No. 33 CIN Tee Higgins (16-214-2)
No. 34 IND Michael Pittman, Jr. (9-73-0)
No. 42 JAX Laviska Shenault (23-270-1)
No. 46 DEN K.J. Hamler (6-78-0)
No. 49 PIT Chase Claypool (13-261-4)