The Pittsburgh Steelers have yet to find a starting-level defensive lineman this offseason. Instead, the team has spent its free agency resources bolstering depth. Isaiahh Loudermilk re-signed while the organization brought in Daniel Ekuale and Esezi Otomewo from the outside. While the focus moves to the NFL Draft and who the team could consider selecting at the top of it, there’s one current Steeler forgotten. Dean Lowry.
It’d be hard to blame anyone for it. Signed to a two-year deal last offseason, Lowry spent the summer injured and the winter inactive. Brought in with the intent of serving as Ekuale or Loudermilk role, rotational base end depth, Lowry began training camp on the PUP list, still recovering from a pectoral tear that cut short his 2023 season.
Ramping up just as camp was ending, Lowry saw preseason action and made the 53-man roster. Inactive the first two weeks of the regular season, he made his regular season debut in Week 3. Playing time was sparse, logging double-digit defensive snaps just once ahead of the bye week.
Pressed into action late in the year following Larry Ogunjobi’s groin injury, Lowry played significant snaps in Week 15 against the Philadelphia Eagles and Week 16 versus the Baltimore Ravens, starting the former. Pittsburgh’s run defense faltered, including giving up 220 rushing yards against the Ravens as part of the Steelers’ five-game losing skid.
Lowry ended the year in street clothes. Inactive for the final three games, the last pair of the regular season and the Steelers’ Wild Card loss, Loudermilk and Montravius Adams handled duties off the bench. Like an NBA lineup, Pittsburgh shortened their bench and placed more on Cam Heyward and Keeanu Benton’s shoulders while Ogunjobi returned.
Lowry’s season ended with a meager stat line. Five tackles across 12 games. To his credit, he had a sack and pass deflection, though the sack came against a scrambling Lamar Jackson on a busted RPO. A low-quality takedown. The sample size was small but his pressure rate was good and his individual highlight came blocking a field goal in a win over the New York Jets during Pittsburgh’s special teams heater.
Advanced metric outlets like PFF were less impressed. They agreed his pass rush was the strongest aspect of his game but graded him out overall 171st out of 174 defensive linemen with at least 100 snaps. His run defense tied for last league-wide.
And yet, he remains on the roster. Though his path and odds to make the 2025 roster are slim, Pittsburgh’s repeated offseason signing signal zero confidence, a modest salary ($2.5 million in 2025) and lack of an option or roster bonus, like the one Ogunjobi had that got him cut, allow the Steelers to hang onto him.
He’s rowing the same canoe as Cordarrelle Patterson. Replacements have been found. Kenneth Gainwell for Patterson, Ekuale for Lowry. But the Steelers will hang onto both, at least through the draft, taking advantage of the zero downside to rostering them for at least a little while longer. Worst-case, they’re injury protection if freak things occur during spring workouts.
Should Lowry make it to training camp, he’ll be an afterthought. Assuming Pittsburgh invests in the draft, he could be running third-team and seeing few practice reps as the team evaluates the new faces brought onboard. Turning 31 in June with a 2023 pec tear and near-invisible 2024 season in a defense that was supposed to suit him, one similar to the Green Bay Packers that made Preston Smith a trade deadline fit, Lowry could be at the end of his NFL line. At the least, his time in Pittsburgh is up even if that might not be made official for a few more months.
