The Pittsburgh Steelers aren’t likely to announce their final roster moves until right around 4:00 p.m. EST today. While some names have already leaked out with more forthcoming, here’s something to maybe consider the next few hours when it comes to a potential trade.
The Carolina Panthers have now announced their cuts and it resulted in them only keeping two quarterbacks, Cam Newton and Taylor Heinicke. The significance of that is that the Panthers have opened Week 1 of the regular season the last several years with three quarterbacks on their 53-man roster. Could they now be looking for another one?
The Panthers reportedly had quite a bit of interest in Steelers quarterback Joshua Dobbs prior to the 2017 NFL Draft. While they decided against drafting a quarterback in 2017, they did claim rookie quarterback Brad Kaaya off waivers after last year’s final roster cuts were made. Kaaya, however, didn’t work out and he was waived by the Panthers in October.
After getting rid of Kaaya, the Panthers promoted quarterback Garrett Gilbert from their practice squad. Gilbert, however, along with fellow quarterback Kyle Allen, were both waived today by the Panthers.
The Panthers have seen quite a bit of Dobbs the last two preseasons and the Tennessee product played well in both games with the latest performance coming this past Thursday night.
In short, perhaps the Panthers might be interested in trading for Dobbs on Saturday. He fits their offense and would likely even be an upgrade over Heinicke. I’m not saying this will happen, but it makes sense. For all we know, the Steelers might decide to keep Dobbs. However, if Dobbs isn’t kept or traded today and is instead waived, I bet the Panthers would consider putting in a claim for him.
Stay tuned.
Edited to add: I just did a quick internet search and it shows that Jourdan Rodrigue of The Charlotte Observer also thinks the Panthers might have interest in Dobbs.
