Several months ago, Gerry Dulac of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette said the Pittsburgh Steelers “intend” on drafting quarterback Ben Roethlisberger a “tall” receiver. With the draft now just one week away, Dulac still believes that’s the team’s intentions.
Dulac said Wednesday in his online chat that Texas A&M wide receiver Mike Evans will be the Steelers first round selection if still on the board come their time to pick, but that they do not expect him to be there. I think he’ll be the first to tell you that isn’t a huge revelation.
Dulac goes on to say in his chat that he’ll be “very surprised” if the Steelers draft any wide receiver smaller than 6-3 in the early rounds. If indeed that winds up being the case, that would narrow down the early round prospects to Kelvin Benjamin, Jordan Matthews and Martavis Bryant. If we were to give Dulac another inch to play with, we could throw Allen Robinson, Donte Moncrief and Cody Latimer into the “tall receiver” pool as well.
As far as Benjamin goes, Dulac thinks there’s a “very good chance” that he could be the Steelers first-round target.
“I will tell you that one of the Steelers people think he is the second best receiver in the draft, after Sammy Watkins,” he said.
While I’m sure the Steelers haven’t revealed their draft strategy to Dulac, there’s no denying that he’s pretty well connected to the team. In a little more than week from today, we’ll know for sure whether or not he’s come up short this offseason on his tall receiver prognostication.
