The Pittsburgh Steelers have made some procedural moves to clean up their injured list during training camp. DL Jacob Slade cleared waivers and reverted to IR. Meanwhile, WR Montana Lemonious-Craig was waived with an injury settlement and DL Dean Lowry was placed on IR.
Slade was one of three Pittsburgh Steelers defensive linemen who injured a knee at practice over the last week. Because of his injury, he was waived/injured on Friday afternoon as the team signed DT Kyler Baugh to backfill his place. Slade has now cleared waivers and reverted back to IR on a split salary, per the NFL transaction sheet.
Depending on the severity of the injury, he may get waived with an injury settlement next week. Given that this was a knee injury, their quick roster move isn’t encouraging for Slade. For now, that split salary should be $490,000.
Slade initially entered the league as an undrafted free agent out of Michigan State to the Arizona Cardinals. He bounced on and off their practice squad for most of his rookie season before signing with the Steelers in January of 2024. He’s been with the team, either on their offseason roster or practice squad, ever since.
Slade had long odds of making the 53-man roster in a crowded defensive line room, but they liked him enough to keep him around on the practice squad all last year. He had a decent shot of returning there if he stayed healthy.
Steelers first-round rookie DT Derrick Harmon credits Slade for teaching him how to play. Slade was a veteran at Michigan State when Harmon was just starting out in college ball.
Lemonious-Craig suffered a soft tissue injury early in training camp. Initially waived/injured and placed on injured reserve, a settlement was expected and confirms that Lemonious-Craig suffered a less serious injury.
Signed by the team following a rookie minicamp tryout in the spring, Lemonious-Craig went through just four practices with the team. Unable to finish the Sunday session on July 27, he was waived/injured two days later as part of a flurry of roster moves the Steelers made. Per our charting, he caught just one pass in the team periods for 15 yards on two total targets and struggled to gain reps at the bottom of Pittsburgh’s wide receiver depth chart.
Injury settlements typically pay a player for the projected length of the injury, usually one to three weeks. Once healthy, Lemonious-Craig will be eligible to sign with any team. He could even return to Pittsburgh, though NFL rules dictate an additional multi-week waiting period to be eligible to re-sign.
The Lowry news broke earlier with the Steelers signing Breiden Fehoko to help replace him and the other injured defensive linemen. You can read about that here.
With a lengthy injury report at the end of Saturday’s practice, we can expect more roster shuffling in the coming days.
