End-of-season player exit meetings are not something that we are often privy to as outsiders of the football world. Generally, we only get a glimpse into that world when a player is asked by a reporter how the meeting went, if the player is willing to discuss it.
Still, it’s not generally a hard concept to grasp, and we have a pretty good feel by now of how Mike Tomlin and his staff likes to operate, and we see all the game film, so it’s not an overly difficult project to simulate. If we were to administer the end-of-season player exit meetings, it might go something like this.
Player: B.W. Webb
Position: Cornerback
Experience: 2 Years
The Steelers added cornerback B.W. Webb to their 53-man roster just prior to the start of the regular season last year after he was waived by the Cowboys, who drafted him in the fourth round of the 2013 NFL Draft.
As a rookie, Webb played a little under 200 snaps for the Cowboys in an awful secondary, registering 16 tackles and deflecting one pass. Tomlin said that Webb was among the players that the Steelers were looking at in that range the year before, so the team decided to pick him up.
It didn’t hurt that he was also an alumnus of William & Mary, Tomlin’s alma mater.
This was the second time in as many years that the Steelers added a cornerback off the waiver wire just prior to the regular season. In 2013, they picked up Antwon Blake, who became a stud on special teams in his first season.
By the end of his second year with the Steelers, Blake began logging significant playing time as an outside corner in the team’s nickel defense. Is there any chance of Webb making a similar jump in the same timeframe?
He may not even have the opportunity if he finds himself buried in the depth chart, depending on how hard the Steelers go after the position during this offseason. He is certainly not a player guaranteed a roster spot.
Unlike Blake, Webb never made himself a fixture on special teams to earn his roster spot, though he did register two special teams tackles and did not perform poorly by any means.
He even logged a snap or three in three different games, for a total of six snaps. He saw three snaps in the dime defense when the Steelers played the Saints, another the following week, and two during the team’s playoff loss.
All of his snaps came in coverage, and he was never targeted, so there’s really nothing to go on for Webb. It is interesting, however, that the Steelers chose to show four cornerbacks in their one foray into the dime look last year, rather than three safeties, which was their preferred look in 2013.
Does Webb have a future with the Steelers? It’s hard to say, and depends greatly on how the team attacks the position in the coming months. Do they like what he’s shown them in practice enough to pencil his name in this year? Or will he be yet another washout, looking for his third team in three seasons?
