The Pittsburgh Steelers have a major set challenges facing them for the offseason of 2019 after they managed to miss the postseason for the first time in five years. The failure has been taken especially grievously because of the fact that the team was in position to control their own fate even for homefield advantage with six games remaining before dropping four games.
And so they find themselves getting the exit meeting process underway at least two weeks earlier than they have had to in years, since they have made it to at least the Divisional Round since 2015. Hopefully they used those extra two weeks with purpose.
While we might not know all the details about what goes on between Head Coach Mike Tomlin and his players during these exit meetings, we do know how we would conduct those meetings if they were let up to us. So here are the Depot’s exit meetings for the Steelers’ roster following the 2018 season.
Player: Jon Bostic
Position: Inside Linebacker
Experience: 6 Years
The Steelers knew that they had to address the inside linebacker position in some form or fashion following the devastating injury suffered by Ryan Shazier toward the end of the 2017 season, but they were looking to do more than what they came away with, signing only Jon Bostic in free agency and failing to come away with any in the draft.
The team was reportedly looking to come away with one of the top four inside linebackers in the first round of the 2018 NFL Draft, but all of them went early, the first time in years that that many players at that position went that early.
Since they didn’t get somebody in the draft that they thought would be able to start right away [please insert your complaints about Darius Leonard here, because we all know they’re coming], they chose to address other needs, believing that they already had depth.
And so there was a ‘competition between Bostic and Tyler Matakevich for the starting job, Bostic obviously winning. But he was the one taken off the field in sub-packages, and ended up playing fewer than 550 snaps in total, even seeing L.J. Fort play over him late in the year.
One thing that Bostic did well was tackle. When he made a tackle attempt, he pretty much always finished it. And he had good instincts for the run game. Where he struggled, shockingly, was in coverage, but the truth is that they didn’t always put him in great positions to succeed.
Still, he was signed to a two-year contract and there is certainly no reason to let him go. He is on a very affording contract and can provide quality depth, provided that they are able to bring in somebody to start ahead of him. While should be a top priority.
