Steelers Looking for Big Game from Veteran DL

PITTSBURGH — The Steelers need help from everyone in the defensive line room, with Cam Heyward out for up to eight weeks due to core muscle surgery. Pittsburgh’s best interior defensive lineman is a massive loss for the team on paper and in practice, but they now have to play on without him if they want to make a run at the playoffs. While some of the younger guys, such as Keeanu Benton and DeMarvin Leal, will get the call-out for most of the week, the Steelers need help from the one proven game-wrecker in the room — Larry Ogunjobi.

Ogunjobi suffered a foot injury in August at training camp and has not felt 100% since then, but he played it out in the team’s Week 1 game. The same thing will happen against the Browns on Monday night, where Ogunjobi will have to play a huge role in shutting down Nick Chubb.

Take it from defensive coordinator Teryl Austin, who knows the team needs to see something from Ogunjobi to get the train moving forward up front. While he had an up-and-down performance at times, Ogunjobi flashed some of the ability that made him a sought-after free agent when he left Cincinnati.

“Yeah, I think he had been limited. He showed some good stuff,” Austin said. “Again, I don’t think we can single out anybody really other than T.J. that really played well last week. We all have to do better. We’ll look at — for the amount of sample size we got from Larry without at practice, I was pleased with his effort. I was pleased with those things, but like anything, there’s a lot of things we can all do better.”