Significantly slower than most people would like, but in a small sample size I believe he is progressing. The LA game he played pretty well as well as the New England game. SF was a trainwreck, but that goes for pretty much the entire team. The Mazi/Hankins of the field as the same time has worked pretty well, you're just limited on how often you can do that. Even on passing plays he isn't quite where you want him to be but he has been solid. Hes been sort of the 'slow rusher' role that typically wont get the QB, but can get a little penetration up the middle to help stop QBs from having a clean pocket to step up in and also doesnt give mobile qbs a lane to run. It's not the sexy job, its also not the job you typically want a 1st round pick to do, but it is an area of positivity.
His snap count has been going up as well. First three games of the year he received 17, 11, and 12 snaps. The last three games he has gotten 17, 22, and 18. It's going slow but he is starting to carve out a bit of a role for the defense. It's starting to get to the point in the year where you'll start to see Mazi either establish himself or he wont. I would evaluate Mazi by splitting the season up into 3 or 4 game chunks. The goal isnt for him to come out and be Jalen Carter from day 1, but if the second chunk of games looks better than the first you've got to stay optimistic on the guy. Now we need to hope that the next chunk of games bring more positives than the previous chunk of games. That's the patience we need with this player. It's not just wait until year 3 and reevaluate, it's as the year goes on do we see small steps in the right direction. So far I would say yes, they have just been baby steps.
