The Pittsburgh Steelers have suffered two key injuries to their inside linebacker group in the last two weeks, losing LB Cole Holcomb to a knee injury and LB Kwon Alexander to a ruptured Achilles that will sideline them for the season. Despite waning depth at the position, Mike Tomlin said the Steelers are staying in-house add to the room.
“We’re not looking outside the organization to be quite honest with you, as I stand here right now in terms of solutions regarding those issues. We have guys that we’re comfortable with, we’ve kind of been forward-thinking in the acquisition of some of our people. Some of our practice squad guys are there not because they’re developmental players, they’re there because they’re capable players that are just readying themselves for an opportunity,” Tomlin said via the Steelers YouTube channel.
One player Tomlin mentioned specifically was Mykal Walker, who is expected to be added to the active roster.
“Walker is a guy who played in Atlanta and had 100-plus tackles or whatever a year ago in the National Football League. He’s not on our practice squad for development,” Tomlin said.
He also praised Tariq Carpenter’s special teams ability and said those two players are going to be ready to step up with Alexander and Holcomb injured.
Carpenter was elevated off the practice squad last week and had an assisted tackle on a kickoff return. He’ll likely be behind Elandon Roberts, Mark Robinson and Walker when it comes to seeing defensive snaps, but he’s going to be an asset going forward on special teams.
Walker is a veteran addition who was a bit of a surprise cut by Atlanta during the offseason, and he should be ready to step in and play for the Steelers. He talked about what he adds to the room yesterday, and having a veteran already on the roster who can step up from the practice squad is important. It was a shrewd move by the front office to add him, especially now with how the injury situation has shaken out.
The Steelers have two key divisional games coming up against the Cleveland Browns in Week 11 and the Cincinnati Bengals in Week 12, and the inside linebacker room is going to be key in those two road games. The communication aspect is going to be something important to pick up, as the Steelers had communication issues against Green Bay. Tomlin said it’s “undecided” whether or not Roberts will wear the green dot on Sunday, but he did take over that role after Alexander suffered his injury on Pittsburgh’s first defensive drive in Week 10.
There are not a lot of NFL-ready guys available to add at this point in the season, so it makes sense that Pittsburgh is going to stick with its internal options. It’s a big opportunity for guys like Walker and Robinson to step up, and we’ll see if they can answer the challenge this week.
