With training camp now less than two weeks away from beginning, we have started running our annual polls asking you to vote on whether or not certain Pittsburgh Steelers players who are perceived as being on the bubble will ultimately make the final 53 man roster out of training camp.
We’ve already had you vote on four players and you can find links to those polls along with the results of each below. Today, we will discuss defensive end Clifton Geathers and have you vote on his future.
2014 Season Recap:
When it comes to recapping Geathers’ 2014 season, there’s really not too much to talk about as he only played 93 snaps last year on defense and all of those were with the Washington Redskins, who released the former sixth-round draft pick last November. Geathers playing time last season resulted in just six total tackles and his best performance came against the run in the Week 3 game against the Philadelphia Eagles.
The Steelers signed Geathers to their roster in early December after losing veteran defensive end Brett Keisel for the season to a triceps injury but the large defensive lineman never received a helmet in any of the team’s remaining games.
Upon joining the team, however, Geathers was involved in a skirmish with several members of the Steelers starting offensive line during a practice and he was accused of practicing too hard.
2015 Outlook:
During his draft press conference, Steelers defensive line coach John Mitchell stated that he requested Geathers be re-signed during the offseason, so that bodes well for him heading into training camp this year. Additionally, Geathers has reportedly dropped 50 pounds since joining the Steelers late last season.
Geathers will presumably be battling for one of six defensive linemen spots this summer with four of those spots already being locked up. Geathers main competition, if you call it that, will be veteran Steelers defensive lineman Cam Thomas, who is coming off of a very unimpressive first season in Pittsburgh. Additionally, Thomas is set to earn $2 million in 2015 and that’s quite a lot to pay a reserve defensive lineman based on what he put down on tape in 2014.
Thanks to Geathers’ size, he should be able to serve as an emergency nose tackle behind Steve McLendon and Daniel McCullers but his primary role with the team this year in training camp should be at defensive end.
As far as other competition that Geathers will face this summer, that will come in the form of Matt Conrath, Ethan Hemer and rookie draft pick L.T. Walton.
Vote below and tell us the reason why you voted the way that you did in the comments.
Previous Polls:
Chris Hubbard
Terence Garvin
B.W. Webb
Darrius Heyward-Bey
