Pittsburgh Steelers safety Minkah Fitzpatrick most recently played at Hard Rock Stadium on Sept. 15, 2019, when he had six tackles and forced and recovered a fumble for the Miami Dolphins.

The Dolphins lost that game 43-0 to the New England Patriots, a week after starting the 2019 season with a 59-10 loss to the Baltimore Ravens.

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A two-time consensus All-American who played on two CFP national championship teams in three seasons at Alabama, Fitzpatrick was on a team supposedly “Tanking for Tua” and being used as a jack-of-all-trades in the Miami defense by Dolphins coach Brian Flores.

Eighteen games after joining Miami as the 11th selection in the 2018 NFL Draft, Fitzpatrick had had enough, and four days after the beatdown by the Patriots, the Dolphins accommodated the defensive back’s desire to get out by trading him to the Pittsburgh Steelers for a first-round draft choice.

On Sunday night, Fitzpatrick will play at Hard Rock Stadium for the first time since the trade when the Steelers and Dolphins square off at 7:20 CDT. NBC will televise the game.

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“My first NFL team, it’s going to be my first time going back there and playing at Hard Rock, and I’ll definitely be nostalgic, for sure,” Fitzpatrick said.

This won’t be Fitzpatrick’s first game against Miami. Five weeks after the trade, the Steelers defeated the Dolphins 27-14 in Pittsburgh as Fitzpatrick intercepted two passes.

The performance was part of a first-team All-Pro season for Fitzpatrick, and he earned that accolade again in 2020.

“Obviously, it was a big, big shift going from one team to another,” Fitzpatrick said. “After being drafted in the first round, it’s not common that you get traded the following year. I had to make decisions and lock in and really try to turn things around.”

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In his 51 games with the Steelers, Fitzpatrick has 14 interceptions, 236 tackles, four fumble recoveries, three interception-return touchdowns and a fumble-recovery TD – a set of stats that no player since the start of the 2019 season can match.

“I’m a lot different player, a lot more mature in my game,” Fitzpatrick said, comparing his Dolphins version to the Steelers model. “Feel like I’m better athletically. Just a combination that allows me to be the player I am today.”

In June, Pittsburgh rewarded Fitzpatrick with a four-year, $73.6 million contract extension.

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Fitzpatrick missed Pittsburgh’s 20-18 victory over the Tampa Bay Buccaneers last week because of a knee injury. A limited participant in practice on Wednesday, Fitzpatrick practiced fully on Thursday and Friday in preparation for Sunday night’s game.

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Mark Inabinett is a sports reporter for Alabama Media Group. Follow him on Twitter at @AMarkG1.