The Pittsburgh Steelers’ 2021 season is over, already eliminated from the postseason after suffering a 42-21 loss at the hands of Patrick Mahomes and the Kansas City Chiefs. They just barely made the postseason with a 9-7-1 record and a little help from their friends.
This is an offseason of major change, with the retirement of Ben Roethlisberger, the possible retirement of general manager Kevin Colbert, and the decisions about the futures of many important players to be made, such as Joe Haden, Stephon Tuitt, JuJu Smith-Schuster, and others.
Aside from exploring their options at the quarterback position, the top global priority, once again, figures to be addressing the offensive line, which they did not do quite adequately enough a year ago. Dan Moore Jr. looks like he may have a future as a full-time starter, but Kendrick Green was clearly not ready. Chukwuma Okorafor is heading into free agency, as is Trai Turner.
These are the sorts of topics 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. There is rarely a concrete answer, but this is your venue for exploring the topics we present through all their uncertainty.
Question: How wide a net have the Steelers cast for a veteran safety?
We were told that the Steelers had reportedly narrowed their focus down to three safeties, including their own free agent, Terrell Edmunds. Then we learned last night that they were reportedly going after a fourth safety, Kareem Jackson, who doesn’t really fit their modus operandi as a 33-year-old.
They didn’t land him, but the fact that they tried to sign a 33-year-old blows out of the water the notion that they wouldn’t be interested in Tyrann Mathieu because of his age, as though that wasn’t already established by the fact that Mathieu talked about the Steelers expressing interest in him.
But now that we know that they went after a fourth safety, it really makes you wonder—or at least makes me wonder—how wide a net the team is actually casting when it comes to looking for their new strong safety.
One thing it tells me is that they are absolutely committed starting a veteran safety this year rather than a draft pick, although that does not preclude them from drafting a safety later this month. I think that was the prevailing assumption all along, but nevertheless, the evidence continues to mount.
Needless to say, the longer this goes on, the more likely they are to look at other options. Neither Mathieu nor Edmunds seem ready to sign the offer(s) that they have on the table, so that means the search goes on. But for how much longer?
