The Pittsburgh Steelers are now in Latrobe at Saint Vincent College, where they have held their training camp sessions since 1966. While the vast majority of the legwork of building the 90-man roster is done, there is always some fine tinkering to do. Now it’s time to figure out who is worthy of a roster spot, and what their role will be.
The team made some bold moves this offseason and in some areas of the roster look quite a bit different than they did a year ago. That would especially be the case at wide receiver and inside linebacker, where they’re bound to have new starters.
How will those position groups sort themselves out? How will the young players advance into their expected roles? Will the new coaches be up to the task? Who is looking good in practice? Who is sitting out due to injury?
These are the sorts of questions among many others that we have been exploring on a daily basis and will continue to do so. Football has become a year-round pastime and there is always a question to be asked, though there is rarely a concrete answer, as I’ve learned in my years of doing this.
Question: Will Sean Davis play in the season opener against the New England Patriots?
This hasn’t been the most successful offseason for Sean Davis, the fourth-year veteran safety, who has dealt with repeated injuries going all the way back to OTAs. He missed the first several practices, and has since suffered additional injuries in training camp and then in the preseason.
He is currently sidelined with an ankle injury suffered in the third preseason game from a partial friendly-fire injury as both he and Kameron Kelly were tackling a ball-carrier. Kelly’s hit pushed the ball-carrier into Davis, whose body folded in on itself and resulted in him injuring his ankle.
While he has previously said that he would be ready for the season opener, it’s not clear if he will, and he did not practice on Monday, the Steelers’ first practice for the regular season of 2019. As would be expected, Kelly practiced with the first-team defense in his stead.
It may actually be the case that the defense has spent as much or more time running with Kelly in the starting lineup this offseason as it has with Davis because of the numerous ailments that have put him on the sideline for periods of time. From that perspective, perhaps his absence wouldn’t necessarily present a major communication issue.
Still, you want to have all of your personnel available to you, and as much as Davis is criticized—there are still those who don’t even believe he merits a roster spot—he is currently the best-tested free safety on the team.
