The Pittsburgh Steelers second OTA session of the 2013 season got underway on Tuesday and veteran free agent nose tackle Casey Hampton still remains unsigned. However, Will Graves of the Associated Press reports via Twitter on Tuesday that Hampton recently told fellow nose tackle Steve McLendon that he still wants to play and that he “can” still play.
As far as we know right now, Hampton hasn\’t received any serious interest from other teams so far this offseason. That being said, he probably isn\’t too upset that he is missing out on the early summer practices.
With Hampton not being around this offseason, the Steelers coaching staff has gotten the opportunity to see what they really have in back up nose tackles Alameda Ta\’amu and Hebron Fangupo. By the time the third and final OTA session is completed next week, they should have a pretty good idea whether or not they need to re-sign Hampton for one more season to solidify their depth at the position.
Should the Steelers ultimately decide to bring Hampton back, he shouldn\’t cost more than the minimum at this stage of the offseason and him missing the first the first three OTA sessions will be very easy to overcome thanks to his many years in the Steelers defense.
