Player: Danny Isidora
Position: Offensive Line
Experience: 4 Years
Free Agent Status: Unrestricted
2020 Salary Cap Hit: $145,588
2020 Season Breakdown:
Well, there isn’t much to speak of, is there, when it comes to Danny Isidora and the Pittsburgh Steelers? A former fifth-round pick of the Minnesota Vikings in 2017, the veteran guard spent two seasons there before being traded to the Miami Dolphins just before the 2019 season. He would miss most of the season on the Reserve/Injured List, and then would fail to make the roster entering the 2020 season.
A few days after being cut, Isidora signed to the Kansas City Chiefs’ practice squad, where he spent a good portion of the year, but he did receive elevations twice at the tail end of the month of October, ultimately playing a whopping two snaps during that time.
The elevation option was newly-created in 2020 as part of the new Collective Bargaining Agreement, and each player is only permitted to be elevated twice per season, so the Chiefs could not dress him for a game again unless they signed him to a 53-man roster contract.
Isidora remained on the Chiefs’ practice squad until the Steelers suffered a rash of injuries in the game against the Buffalo Bills, with first left guard Matt Feiler going down, and then his replacement, Kevin Dotson, following right after him.
With those injuries, Pittsburgh signed Isidora to their 53-man roster off of Kansas City’s practice squad; however, he never played a snap for the Steelers despite spending a few weeks on the team. He was signed merely to serve as depth, and fortunately Dotson was able to return after missing one game.
Free Agency Outlook:
Given Matt Feiler’s status as an unrestricted free agent and the retirement of Maurkice Pouncey, it’s not unreasonable to imagine that the Steelers might re-sign Isidora on a one-year minimum signing bonus deal. Chances are he will not find better than that on the open market for a player who only has six starts and under 500 snaps over a four-year period, having done so without distinction.
Literally, the only interior offensive linemen that the Steelers are currently scheduled to have under contract or can be safely projected to be are starting right guard David DeCastro and second-year reserve J.C. Hassenauer.
They do, however, have a crapload of tackles under contract, but the majority of them are the sorts of players that you would find on practice squads. The bottom line is that the Steelers need some bodies here, at the bare minimum, and re-signing Isidora would certainly not preclude them from signing a veteran in free agency and then also drafting one.
