Here’s an interesting dead part of the offseason exercise courtesy of Twitter that’s sure to get you thinking and it comes courtesy of user @JoeGoodberry.
The exercise somewhat parallels the upcoming NHL expansion draft and if you’re unfamiliar with the rules of that, each team has the option to protect seven forwards, three defensemen and one goalie, or eight skaters and one goalie. Additionally, all first- and second-year players are exempt from selection.
As you can see in the original tweet below from Goodberry, the rules for this particular exercise are quite simple. In short, you have to choose 10 current Pittsburgh Steelers players to protect from an expansion draft if you were general manager Kevin Colbert. Please keep in mind that all first- and second-year players are exempt from selection so you don’t need to worry about protecting any of them.
While it’s a bit of a backwards way of doing the exercise considering not only the size of NFL rosters, in addition to it being different from the NFL has handled expansion drafts in the past, it is a very creative one nonetheless.
In case you’re curious, the last time the NFL held an expansion draft was in 2002 when the Houston Texans entered the league and the rules for that event included the 31 other teams needing to expose five players to the draft.
The Steelers, in case you forgot or didn’t know, exposed wide receiver Troy Edwards, fullback John Witman, guard Roger Duffy, wide receiver Will Blackwell and long snapper Mike Schneck to the 2002 expansion draft and none we’re ultimately selected by the Texans.
Here’s the full list of 155 exposed players in 2002 and the results of the draft in case you’re curious.
Ok, now that you all know the rules of this exercise, please post the 10 Steelers players you would protect from an expansion draft in the comments below.
