Super sports agent Drew Rosenhaus was present at the Pittsburgh Steelers Sunday training camp practice and with him representing several players on the team’s roster such as defensive backs Joe Haden, Mike Hilton and Sean Davis, it’s easy to speculate he was at Latrobe to discuss the contracts of at least one of the three. Of the three defensive backs just named, Haden is the one that is the most-likely to sign a contract extension with the Steelers before the start of the 2019 regular season. On Monday, Steelers general manager Kevin Colbert was a guest on 93.7 The Fan and he was asked if he can foresee Haden staying in Pittsburgh for the long haul.
“I hope so,” Colbert said. “I mean, Joe Haden is as professional a player as you could want and he’s a really good corner. He’s a great team-guy. And you want Joe Haden to be part of us as long as he can. So, hopefully he does remain with us. Obviously, he’s here this year and again, we’ll look at and see where everything goes and if it all makes sense for everybody on all sides. Then, you know, we can maybe have a good player that’s a great team-guy for more than one year.”
As most should know by now, Haden is now in the final year of the three-year, $27 million contract he signed with the Steelers just prior top the start of the 2017 regular season and just after he was released by the Cleveland Browns. He is scheduled to earn a base salary in 2019 of $10 million and his cap charge is currently scheduled to be $11,916,668. That cap charge number can potentially be lowered some as a result of a contract extension.
On the surface, it appears as though that Haden will get signed to an extension sometime in the next several weeks and he hinted as much this past Thursday when he spoke with the media after arriving at Saint Vincent College for the start of training camp. The Steelers, however, might want to first wait and make sure that Haden, who just turned 30 years of age this past April, makes it through all of training camp and the preseason fully healthy.
For Haden to become one of the top 15 highest paid cornerbacks in the NFL, he’ll need a new money average of $12 million. A new money average of more than $12.5 million would put Haden in the top 10 highest-paid cornerbacks in the NFL. In all likelihood, and assuming the Steelers are able to get Haden signed to an extension in the coming weeks, it’s a good bet that his new money average will be at least $12 million and that at least two years are added on to his current deal. In short, Haden would then be signed through the 2021 season.
Judging by what all both sides have said since Steelers training camp started, it’s just a matter of when Haden signs a contract extension, not if he will.
