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: Nat Berhe
Position: Safety
Experience: 5 Years
There was a point this offseason in which I legitimately forgot that Nat Berhe was ever even on the 53-man roster. The hard-hitting safety was brought in primarily as a special teams replacement for Robert Golden, but even in that capacity, he was only used on half of the four primary units—both kicking and punt returns and coverage.
Berhe was initially released because his contract was the most expendable, but that was done only so that they could retain rookie Olasunkanmi Adeniyi on the 53-man roster after the final cuts in order to place him on the injured reserve list while retaining his eligibility to return later in the season.
He was re-signed before the first game and was active on each one. When Morgan Burnett, who had been playing in the dime role in sub-packages, was injured in the second game, it was Berhe who replaced him. He would finish the season with three tackle before he suffered a season-ending injury of his own after four total games played.
The Steelers already had an abundance of safeties, however, with Sean Davis and Jordan Dangerfield being retained from the previous season, Burnett being a significant free agent signing, and then having drafted both Terrell Edmunds and Marcus Allen in the 2018 NFL Draft—all of whom were already on the 53-man roster.
And all of them remain under contract with the Steelers, except for Berhe, who through his agent said that he is fully healthy and ready to sign with a team. He is now an unrestricted free agent, but I don’t envision the Steelers showing much of any interest in re-signing him at this point. If anything, Allen could be in for a bigger role in year two.
