Doing three jobs assures Bush of one Wednesday, August 12, 1998
BY CHRIS HAFT
The Cincinnati Enquirer
GEORGETOWN, Ky. -- The variety of places where Steve Bush can be found no longer includes the end of the bench.
Referring to Bush as a second-year tight end fails to capture his job description for the Bengals, who have grown increasingly reliant upon him in a relatively short time.
"His stock has gone up," Bengals tight ends coach Bob Wylie said.
Bush not only shares backup duties with Marco Battaglia but also has emerged as a viable alternative as a blocking fullback and as a long-snapper. He's assertive enough in the backfield to have slightly eased the Bengals' worries about starting fullback Brian Milne, who's sidelined for an indefinite period with a back injury. And he's capable enough as a snapper to present a genuine challenge to veteran Greg Truitt.
Football coaches and personnel people love to repeat "The more you can do . . . ", an unfinished sentence conveying the importance of versatility. Bush obviously has taken this maxim to heart.
"He likes to be on the field," coach Bruce Coslet said. "That's no problem with Steve."
For a player with complex responsibilities, Bush maintains a simple mindset. "I'm trying to compete and play just like everybody else," he said.
Bush, who's entering his second season out of Arizona State, complements Battaglia, a third-year veteran. Coaches view Battaglia as being more effective on pass patterns and as the "move" tight end, who is put in motion behind the line of scrimmage before the ball is snapped. They see Bush, at 6-foot-3 and 258 pounds, as being a little more powerful than the 6-3, 252-pound Battaglia, and thus a prime candidate for fullback chores.
"Even though they're both tight ends, they're a little different on what they can do and we're going to use them in that vein," Coslet said.
Bush, 24, said he played fullback last year when Milne was out for brief periods.
Because the "move" tight end frequently blocks on running plays, Bush said that moving to fullback wasn't totally foreign. "It's just a little different technique," he said. "You really get a full head of steam (at fullback). There's a lot of collision involved. You're 5 or 6 yards away from (the player to block), while on the line of scrimmage you're 1 or 2."
Playing multiple positions didn't mar Bush's performance in last Saturday's preseason opener against the New York Giants. "He didn't play that much, but he didn't have any missed assignments," Wylie said.
Improvement was Bush's assignment during the offseason. Given his modest status as an undrafted free agent, he had a decent rookie year in 1997, appearing in every game, mostly on special teams. But he played offense only briefly in four games and caught no passes. So Bush worked on refining his footwork and route-running. Bush also saw an opportunity to enhance his value by long-snapping, a duty he handled in two games last season when injuries knocked out Truitt. He practiced snapping between two and four times each week, often with his father, Jim, who tried out with the Dallas Texans of the old AFL.
Now Bush is poised to benefit from a year of playing and preparing.
"Having gone through it makes the whole situation a lot easier," said Bush.
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