The Pittsburgh Steelers will be taking an important step in the offseason when the 2024 NFL Draft begins on Thursday. The Steelers have many needs throughout their roster that has a lot of evident holes, and there are only so many players that have the potential to do everything the Steelers need from them. Due to the sheer amount of needs up and down Pittsburgh’s roster, their first round pick is extremely important, and also a bit mysterious.
There are quality players at multiple positions of need that should be available when the 20th pick rolls around, but General Manager Omar Khan and Head Coach Mike Tomlin gave no insight during their press conference on Monday as to what their plan is with the pick. Tomlin addressed the media and suggested they are making too much out of the pre-draft visits the Steelers held, along with their visits to Pro Days. The two Steelers decision makers tried telling the media that they are comfortable with their current situation at center, despite the fact that they don’t have a pure and experienced center on the roster.
Mark Kaboly of The Athletic saw right through Khan and Tomlin’s lies, and shared his thoughts in an article published early Tuesday morning.
“It was full-on silly season over on the Southside on Monday, which is somewhat of a new development. You can’t deny the Steelers need a center. But once again, the decision-makers noted they have position flexibility already on the roster. Nate Herbig (who has fewer than 60 career snaps at center), James Daniels (who hasn’t played there since 2019), Spencer Anderson (a tackle who has played a total of two NFL snaps on offense, neither at center, and barely played the position in college) and Ryan McCollum (an underrated guy who has one career start and 101 snaps in three years) are flexible. But do you trust them or even remotely want to rely on them?”
The four center options currently on the Steelers roster are not options that the organization should feel comfortable with going into the regular season. Ryan McCollum is the only ‘true’ center among the options, and he hasn’t been good enough the past two seasons to make it off the practice squad. Meanwhile, Spencer Anderson barely saw the field in 2023 and James Daniels and Nate Herbig just aren’t experienced enough. The truth of the matter is, Pittsburgh needs a center, badly. Hopefully Khan and Tomlin know that, and are just playing this shenanigan to blow smoke prior to the draft.
Steelers Lied About More Than Just The Center Position
Center and wide receiver are arguably the Steelers’ two biggest needs heading into the 2024 NFL Draft. Both positions have pretty much been picked apart in free agency, and there aren’t many options left on the open market, meaning the draft is the best way to build the positions for next season. George Pickens needs a true number two receiver behind him in order to take the defensive pressure off of him, and that option is not on the current roster.
During the press conference on Monday, Tomlin suggested that he is comfortable with his current wide receiver room, which has Pickens and then a bunch of fringe-wide receiver three caliber players. Kaboly once again suggested that this couldn’t be true, as the wide receiver behind Pickens at this instance is Van Jefferson.
“Talk all you want about center and right tackle, but the biggest hole that needs to be filled — or it could destroy the offseason advances they made with the hiring of Offensive Coordinator Arthur Smith and the acquisitions of [Russell] Wilson and [Justin] Fields — is at receiver. Nothing is interesting about the Jefferson/Watkins/Mims/Callaway group. We don’t know about [Calvin] Austin, and he could be the wild card in all of this, but if the Steelers don’t come out of this draft with a quality receiver — and when I say quality, I mean one within the first 51 picks or a veteran acquired via trade — they are asking for problems.”
As it currently stands, the Steelers passing game is easy to cover by any average secondary across the league. Pickens will garner a lot of attention, someone needs to keep an eye on Pat Freiermuth, but apart from that, there is no real threat in the passing game. This will make life difficult for Russell Wilson, or Justin Fields, which would make all the Steelers’ offensive offseason additions up until this point meaningless.
Thankfully for the Steelers, the 2024 wide receiver class is deep, meaning they don’t necessarily need to spend a first round pick on a receiver in order to see results. The Steelers should have plenty of quality options at receiver with the 51st pick, and assuming some receivers fall down the board, they should have some options in the third round as well.
Do you agree with Kaboly? Are Tomlin and Khan blowing smoke towards the Steelers positions of need ahead of the draft?
