Amari Cooper

For the record, no actual hate towards Amari Cooper. He was just a thorn in the Pittsburgh Steelers' side last night and I can't pass up the chance to.

The Steelers bite hard and Cooper cuts across the field, creating space against Cam Sutton and Brissett puts it on him for a 32-yard gain. Cooper added a couple of nice plays along the way but those were the biggest ones and none of this even considers his would-be long catch-and-run negated by him stepping out of bounds. Sutton has outside leverage and Cooper uses a great stair step to initially push vertical and then snap the route off on the crosser to create explosion and space. Sutton ends up trailing and can only tackle the catch to prevent a long touchdown. Edmunds is getting too much depth on the snap, far too much of a cushion, and he isn’t able to drive on the football to make a play on the throw, instead running parallel and trying to tackle the catch. LB Robert Spillane is walking out with him is a strong man-coverage indicator, though it’s worth pointing out the Steelers played zone out of that look in Week One against the Bengals, a play that led to Witherspoon’s pick in Week One. Cooper is essentially running a speed out at a bit deeper depth of nine yards, right at the sticks. 3rd and 1 on the first play of the fourth quarter. That forces Witherspoon to open his hips and as Witherspoon does, Cooper breaks his route off to the sideline. This creates a ton of separation as Witherspoon has to flip his hips around to match him and Brissett makes a good sideline throw with Cooper tapping both feet inbounds. With only two cornerbacks on the field, Terrell Edmunds is tasked to align against Cooper over the slot. He picked up where he left off in their Week Two loss to the New York Jets, finishing last night’s victory with seven catches for 101 yards and a touchdown.