Former Pittsburgh Steelers RB Jawon Chisholm was a guest on The Good Hustle podcast, and he touched on his experience with the Steelers and what it was like getting cut by the team in 2015. Chisholm told a story about when he was exiting a hot tub and a cornerback, whose name he didn’t remember but was presumably B.W. Webb, came in and told him they were making cuts, and the Steelers were just giving players a black bag and telling them to leave the facility. Chisholm said he got the call shortly after talking to Webb, who had just found out he was released, but he did get a chance to talk to Mike Tomlin before leaving the facility.
Chisholm was a running back out of Toledo who signed with the Steelers as an undrafted free agent ahead of the 2015 season.
“He said they just do the black bag and told him to go. And says they just gave a guy a black bag and told him to go. Man, he’s busting out in tears. Now, mind you, the first cuts was already tragic. You see grown men in tears with black bags like Santa Claus. You gotta pack, and you gotta go,” Chisholm said. “The coaches usually don’t talk to you when you leave out. You take your bag, coach say, ‘you’re not, you know.'”
Chisholm said both Mike Tomlin and Kevin Colbert wanted to talk to him before he left, but Colbert told him they were cutting him because they couldn’t trust him in pass protection. He got a chance to talk to Tomlin, who encouraged him to keep playing football. He doesn’t seem to have any ill will over getting cut, as he praised Tomlin and called him the “most real” coach and said he had nothing bad to say about the organization.
It just goes to show how tough the business is in the NFL and that it truly is a business. Cutting down from 90 to 53 isn’t easy as an organization. Due to the nature of the number of cuts, it can be hard to personally meet with each player who got cut. While Chisholm got that opportunity, meeting with both Colbert and Tomlin and talking to them before he left the building, it can’t be easy for players to just get a black bag and be told to get on their way.
While some players can catch on elsewhere, as Webb did, continuing his career until 2019, it’s the end of their lifelong dream for some. Chisholm never got another opportunity in the league after being released by Pittsburgh, and he’s one of many players who see their careers come to an end after giving it their all throughout the offseason and training camp.
It takes a lot of mental fortitude to play in the NFL and deal with all the ups and downs and trials and tribulations, but that’s what most NFL players have to deal with as they try to make the roster. It’s interesting to hear the process behind how the Steelers make, or at least made their cuts, and it really shows just how tough the human side of the league can be for players.
