The Pittsburgh Steelers were busy on Monday, as they cut Mitch Trubisky, Chukwuma Okorafor, and Pressley Harvin III to clear some salary cap space before the new league year begins on March 13th. It was unusual to see a team so active less than 24 hours after the 2023 season ended with Super Bowl LVIII, but the Steelers decided to rip the Band-Aid off and start the offseason running.
Steelers General Manager Omar Khan will surely make a few more moves this spring to clear more salary cap space and position the team to bring in some free agents to improve the roster before the 2024 season begins. Kristopher Knox from Bleacher Report wrote about three players who are looking for new teams this winter that the Steelers should avoid. All three players are at positions of obvious need for the 2024 roster: Center, offensive tackle, and quarterback.
IOL Connor Williams
Miami Dolphins center, Connor Williams was first on the list from Knox. Williams has shown flashes of being a great player during his career with both Miami and the Dallas Cowboys. Dallas was where Williams started his career after being selected in the second round of the 2018 NFL Draft. Knox detailed why Williams would be a risky signing.
“Miami Dolphins lineman Connor Williams has played both center and guard, and he’s done it at a high level when healthy. The problem is that he’s suffered two torn ACLs as a pro, his latest coming in December. There’s simply no guarantee that Williams will be at or near 100 percent when the 2024 season kicks off. There’s even less of a guarantee that he’ll return to pre-injury form. With a projected market value of $13.5 million annually, the Steelers are unlikely to land him at a bargain price. Given the cap situation, signing Williams is a risk-reward move that the Steelers simply can’t afford to make.”
The two torn ACLs certainly jump off the page, especially with one just two months ago. The Steelers will also have a pretty tight salary cap situation, so $13.5 million annually to a center that will be 27 by next season might not be the direction the Steelers want to go in. The draft might be the most effective way for the Steelers to solve their center position issues.
OT Jonah Williams
Cincinnati Bengals offensive tackle, Jonah Williams was next on Knox’s list. Steelers fans should recognize the former first-round pick from the 2019 NFL Draft since the Steelers have been facing this rival twice a season for the entirety of his young career thus far. Stealing a player from a rival is always a fun twist, but Knox warns against Williams.
“Signing Williams would give Pittsburgh some flexibility in its approach to the tackle rotation. However, it would also come at a cost. Because of his draft status, Williams is likely to see at least a mid-level contract and has a projected market value of $10.8 million annually. That’s not outlandish for a tackle in the modern NFL, but it’s more than the Steelers should be willing to pay. Williams hasn’t been a dependable starter at either tackle spot, and he would not be a clear upgrade over [Dan] Moore [Jr.]. Though Williams was more effective as a run blocker on the right side than he was in previous years, he was still responsible for five penalties and eight sacks allowed, per PFF [Pro Football Focus].”
The Steelers will have Dan Moore Jr. and Broderick Jones under contract still in 2024, so if Williams is not an upgrade over either, it would be a tough sell to ownership to make that investment. Again, the draft might be the ideal choice for fixing their offensive tackle position woes.
Quarterback Sam Darnold
The final player on Knox’s list was a former first-round pick by the New York Jets, Sam Darnold. Darnold spent the 2024 season with the San Francisco 49ers in an attempt to revitalize his career after poor stints with the Jets and Carolina Panthers. Signing a veteran quarterback who had a year to work with a strong offensive mind like Kyle Shanahan might seem like an appropriate risk to take, but Knox reminds Steelers fans that an idea like that is the reason they are still in this mess.
“Taking a flier on a former first-rounder like San Francisco 49ers quarterback Sam Darnold might seem like a logical way to approach both goals. Darnold has flashed potential at times, and he’ll turn just 27 in June. However, Pittsburgh just took a similar approach with Mitch Trubisky, and the results weren’t great. Trubisky flopped as a starter before being replaced by [Kenny] Pickett in 2022, but he was just good enough to keep Mason Rudolph on the bench for two games (both losses) following Pickett’s 2023 ankle injury. There’s no reason to repeat that path.”
The Steelers can certainly do better than Darnold and have been linked to players better than Darnold already. The two may be better off trying to solve their respective issues separately, instead of trying to do so together.
