Riley Nowakowski

Henry Olinger, the linebacker, who's one of their higher rated recruits in this year's, this past year's class, and a million dollars to cover some of the costs here.

But for me to get Jamari Johnson to this offense, really the one thing that they haven't had, Riley Nowakowski was solid and valuable as a blocker.

They've never really had under Kurt Cignetti like a significant receiving threat at tight end.

Nowakowski was decent, but again, kind of versatile and was really more helpful as a blocker.

It was used sparingly last year, but strategically last year.

Riley Nowakowski, I think, was extremely underrated.

I tried to spread that message all year.

And man, when they called his name, he delivered every single time.

Some of the biggest moments of the year last year were from Riley Nowakowski extending drives on big third down plays and tight end screens and things like that.

The tight end spot has been non-existent this year for Indiana.

And we saw just us.

He's been very good in pass blocking, and he's been around the same level as his teammates so far in run blocking on the season.

You look at the tight ends, both Riley Nowakowski and Holden Stays were pretty good as blockers last year.

Both of them have exceeded what any of the tight ends that Indiana's had so far this year have managed to do in terms of blocking.

Trevor Gibbs has been decent at pass block and has been, frankly, pretty poor at run blocking from a grading perspective.

Nine points overall on that front.

You look at the target share for tight ends and running backs.

This is where missing Riley Nowakowski and Holden stays has really hurt.

It's dropped from 19% of targets in 2025 to only 10% of targets in 2026 across that group.

And the way that – it almost feels like the way they're running the football is – You have Zach Frazier, okay? I don't know if the Steelers have forgotten about that, but their best two offensive linemen right now are Zach Frazier and Mason McCormick.

And maybe just toss some Riley Nowakowski out there and run it up the middle, you know? Because Jalen Warren does love to fall forward.

It just feels like they're making it a little bit too complex in the red zone.

That's what I think.

Awesome.

And then obviously names like Drew Allard, Jennings Dunker, Riley Nowakowski, not getting a Eli Heinrich, obviously not getting a ton of run as rookies, which, you know, some of these day two and beyond rookies, that's, that's kind of the expectation.

You want to ease them in a little bit.

Um, but one rookie that has seen a significant amount of playing time is seventh round pick Robert Spears Jennings, uh, thrust into rule as a seventh round pick again, never easy, but you know, this is kind of the thing that the Steelers have done with either UDFAs or like very late day three defensive backs.