Pittsburgh Steelers kicker Chris Boswell is likely glad to have this week of OTA practices behind him. Boswell, who was criticized by a few select ornery members of the media during the Steelers first week of OTA practices for failing to conduct a question and answer session, finally did so on Tuesday and in doing so faced mostly several versions of the same question in regard to what he thought was the reason why he performed so poorly during the 2018 season.
At one point during Tuesday’s media session, Boswell was asked if he had a chance to work more with former Steelers kicker Shaun Suisham this past offseason.
“No, I haven’t,” BoswelI said. “I just got back for OTAs and he’s a pretty busy guy playing all this hockey and his girls and everything. So, I mean, I reach out to him now and then, but I’m not going to be a guy to bother him.”
As it turns out, Boswell ended this week getting to work some with Suisham as Aditi Kinkhabwala of the NFL Network reported on Thursday that the Steelers former kicker was in attendance for the team’s Thursday OTA practice, the final one of this week.
Not only did Boswell get some one-on-one coaching from Suisham late last season during Steelers practices, it sounds like the former undrafted kicker out of Rice got quite a few suggestions from the team’s fan base in 2018 as well.
“You know I’m not going to comment on that,” Boswell joked when asked about getting some suggestions from fans last season.
At one point during Boswell’s Tuesday interview with the media he was also asked if another former Steelers kicker, Jeff Reed, had indeed reached out to try to work with him this past offseason.
“No, nothing at all,” Boswell said when asked about any contact from Reed.
With this week of media obligations now behind him, hopefully Boswell can now look forward to a quiet remainder of the offseason practices so that he can continue to concentrate on regaining the consistent form that he had prior to the 2018 season. Boswell has plenty of pressure on him this offseason as it is as not only do the Steelers now have a young kicker on their roster to challenge him in the form of Matthew Wright out of Central Florida, he also stands to lose $3 million in 2019 earnings should he ultimately fail to make the 53-man roster at the conclusion of the preseason.
According to Boswell on Tuesday, he’s not taking anything for granted right now and he certainly knows he’s not guaranteed to be the team’s kicker in 2019.
“Yeah, I mean, everybody’s got to convince them,” Boswell said. “We’re here, we’re day-to-day, week-to-week, game-to-game. You know, no one’s locked in and so I’m just here, as long as they’ll have me, I’m here for the next practice, the next kick, and that’s all I’m focusing on.”
By the sound of things, Suisham will also continue to focus on Boswell’s kicking some the remainder of the summer as well.
