The Pittsburgh Steelers and Green Bay Packers will face each other at the end of October in front of a national audience. As the Steelers added the Packers’ legendary QB Aaron Rodgers, his former team made things a little easier on him with the pending release of CB Jaire Alexander, per Ian Rapoport.
Alexander’s contract saga has been going on all offseason. The Packers discussed a possible trade with him and briefly looked into restructuring his contract before eventually deciding to make a clean break and release him outright.
According to SI.com’s Albert Breer, Alexander was offered a reduced one-year deal with incentives to stay in Green Bay, but he turned it down.
The Packers opted to not draft a corner until the seventh round with Micah Robinson, though they did sign former Las Vegas Raiders CB Nate Hobbs as a free agent. Their secondary has been a weak point of their roster, especially when Alexander has been unavailable to them, playing just 14 games over the last two seasons.
When healthy, Alexander is one of the better corners in the league. He had a pair of Pro Bowl and second-team All-Pro selections from 2020 to 2022 prior to his injuries in recent years.
He was placed on season-ending IR after having his knee scoped for a PCL injury late last year. His last game played was Week 11 against the Chicago Bears, and he had been in and out of the lineup before that.
The Steelers had been linked to Alexander as a possible trade target earlier in the offseason. They since signed Darius Slay and Brandin Echols while drafting Donte Kent in the seventh round. Alexander was already due a ton of money with the Packers and looking for a new contract and won’t be cheap for whoever signs him.
The Steelers also don’t like doing incentive-laden deals for non quarterbacks, which is what likely makes sense for Alexander at the moment.
While the Steelers technically could make it work, he wouldn’t fit in with the current way the roster is constructed. Slay is only a one-year Band-Aid, but they are still paying him good money. And they aren’t going to demote Joey Porter Jr. at this point in his career. And how wise would it be to sign a player with an extensive injury history?
