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—some already decided, some not.
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 was re-signed, but Trai Turner was not. James Daniels and Mason Cole were added in free agency.
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: Is Terrell Edmunds locked into the starting job at strong safety, as he suggested?
Terrell Edmunds did not re-sign with the Steelers until late April, just before the start of the draft. He reportedly had an offer hanging out there from Pittsburgh for a while, which is likely what he ended up signing—a one-year, four-year-veteran qualifying contract worth a bit over $2.5 million but with a reduced cap hit less than half of that amount.
And then less than a week later, after the draft, the Steelers signed Damontae Kazee, another veteran safety with a similar amount of starting experience. Edmunds told reports during OTAs that he feels his starting job is “locked down”, even though Kazee, in theory, is similarly capable.
But what about when we get to training camp? Could the coaching staff decide to give Kazee a look in the starting lineup? He had already been working in the starting lineup during the spring with Minkah Fitzpatrick sitting out of team practices.
While I think it’s unlikely—and Fitzpatrick really likes playing with Edmunds; plus, Kazee is probably better suited at free safety than strong safety—could we really say at this point that the Steelers won’t at least give it a look to see how it feels? There are usually opportunities during practice to mix and match personnel here and there with different strings, anyway.
