Mike Tomlin and the Pittsburgh Steelers over the course of the next few days will whittle their 90-man roster down to 53. While they could do it all in one fell swoop, odds are they will release chunks at a time. But, as Tomlin told Bob Labriola, there aren’t many decisions to make at this juncture.
“I think it’s cut and dry if you’ve got a good process”, Tomlin said about making the Steelers’ roster decisions. “By that I mean if you have a fair process and guys are given an opportunity to carve out a role or state the case for themselves, I think by the time you get to that point in the journey, decisions are pretty obvious, and anybody who’s within the collective usually is not surprised by those decisions”.
Tomlin added that there may be one or two decisions that “require some discussion”, but for the most part, the decisions take care of themselves. Tomlin believes the Steelers have a process in place that largely takes care of itself.
Of course, that is the Steelers portion of the equation only, and Tomlin acknowledged that there is much more involved. After all, the Steelers are only one of 32 teams. All of them have 90 players on their roster, and all have to get to 53 by the same time.
You’re talking about more than 1,000 players that are suddenly out of a job within a few days of each other. And Tomlin and the Steelers have to consider all options, including players cut by other teams. They also have to consider players on the bubble whom teams may be willing to trade.
“There might be trade discussions and things of that nature. What’s one organization’s trash might be another organization’s treasure”, Tomlin said about putting the finishing touches on the Steelers’ roster. “In terms of looking at the 90 that we have, it’s pretty cut and dry. But in terms of interweaving the 90 that everyone has, that’s what provides a little bit of complexity to the last component of the process”.
Tomlin and the Steelers are no strangers to last-minute maneuvers. They traded Kevin Dotson and Kendrick Green at the end of the process just last year. Years earlier, they signed Ross Cockrell to the 53-man roster after another team waived him. Those are just a couple examples off my head, but the point is this is a common occurrence.
The Steelers can’t control those variables until they present themselves, though. In the meantime, they have to concern themselves with the 90 players they have and what constitutes the best 53 within it. Based on Mike Tomlin’s comments, it sounds as though he doesn’t feel this will be a very complicated process.
Of course, in most years, you can safely predict about 45 roster spots, if not more, from the outside. Mike Tomlin and the Steelers obviously know vastly more than we do about how they evaluate the roster. And they also know where they feel they need to try to upgrade if they can.
