As is usually the case when the Pittsburgh Steelers season comes to an end, several players will be having surgeries during the offseason. While that full list of players won’t be known for a few more weeks, Steelers head coach Mike Tomlin said Tuesday during his season-ending press conference that he already knows of one player who will go under the knife in the coming days. That player is linebacker Tyler Matakevich.
“We’ve got medical things we need to address. I don’t have a lot of details there. Some of you guys know that guys were dealing with ongoing things,” Tomlin said Tuesday. “Some of those things may have been scheduled. One that comes to mind, I think Tyler Matakevich is scheduled for shoulder surgery on Wednesday.”
Matakevich suffered his shoulder injury during the Steelers Week 13 home win over the Cincinnati Bengals. While it resulted in him missing one game, he was able to ultimately finish out the season.
Steelers guard Ramon Foster also said Tuesday morning during his weekly interview on 93.7 The Fan that he plans on having minor surgery on one of his thumbs during the offseason as well. That might be the same thumb that Foster injured earlier in the season in the Steelers win over the Minnesota Vikings.
“Some of the other stuff is obviously a lot more tentative,” Tomlin said Tuesday. “We’ve got to check those boxes as well and we will, but just simply going through the normal procedure and just not underscoring that. It’s important that we do a good job of that because it really defines the start of the next journey. And let’s face it, that’s all we have, because this journey is over and there’s finality in it.”
As the offseason progresses, we’ll make sure to pass along any other news on players that plan to have surgery just as we always do at this time of year.
