WRs game one...

[Kodiak]

Well, I'll tell you this: if Ebron doesn't start lighting it up, his contract is very cuttable and you could very well see Mcdonald and Ebron go buh bye.

That might make more sense than letting JuJu walk.

Also, I wonder given their injury history and recent production how much those guys would actually cost? You might be able to keep one at a much more friendly cap number. Hard to see either getting more than $3M as back-up TE on the market.

Any chance Claypool could play TE? 6'4" 240 vs. Ebron at 6'4" 253. I know there's more to it than that, but maybe it's a better option to keep JuJu and acknowledge that some scrub TE isn't going to help just to get a "true" TE on the field.

[Kodiak]

Also, if we were drafting today....TE might look like a better pick in late R1 with all the top DB's already gone. Or maybe a RB. Those are the 3 positions I'd be looking to spend an R1 on.

[COR-TEN]

So what's the deal with Ghentry?

[Jobu]

Also, if we were drafting today....TE might look like a better pick in late R1 with all the top DB's already gone. Or maybe a RB. Those are the 3 positions I'd be looking to spend an R1 on.

I don’t know that the Steelers use the TE in the manner that would ever justify a 1st round pick.

[Scunge]

If worst case scenario happens and the cap is only $175 million next season then there simply are no options to keep JuJu, sign Dupree, none of that will happen.

Just to get compliant with that $175 million means the Steelers have to cut some vets that they might not want to.

Cutting a Chickillo or a Barron was easy, but to be forced to cut Vince Williams? To be forced to cut Joe Haden? It isn't just about cutting a McDonald and/or Ebron to free up money, it is about cutting them and Williams and Haden.

All of those cuts and a few restructures just to meet the $175 million cap. None of those cuts and restructures are going to free up money to sign Dupree to an extension or slap a $16 million franchise tag on JuJu, all of those freed up resources, savings will have to be used JUST to get under the $175 million cap.

Enjoy the defense this year, it is bittersweet, because we will have a mini rebuild in 2021. Dupree, Hilton, Haden, Vince Williams and Cam Sutton may all be wearing different uniforms next season.

[bradshaw2ben]

If worst case scenario happens and the cap is only $175 million next season then there simply are no options to keep JuJu, sign Dupree, none of that will happen.

Just to get compliant with that $175 million means the Steelers have to cut some vets that they might not want to.

Cutting a Chickillo or a Barron was easy, but to be forced to cut Vince Williams? To be forced to cut Joe Haden? It isn't just about cutting a McDonald and/or Ebron to free up money, it is about cutting them and Williams and Haden.

All of those cuts and a few restructures just to meet the $175 million cap. None of those cuts and restructures are going to free up money to sign Dupree to an extension or slap a $16 million franchise tag on JuJu, all of those freed up resources, savings will have to be used JUST to get under the $175 million cap.

Enjoy the defense this year, it is bittersweet, because we will have a mini rebuild in 2021. Dupree, Hilton, Haden, Vince Williams and Cam Sutton may all be wearing different uniforms next season.

I outlined a path in another thread. I think they can keep Dupree or JuJu without a huge upheaval, but keeping both would require some tough but reasonable moves. They can get under the cap and have enough room to sign rookies and filler FAs just by re-doing Ben's deal, walking away from McDonald, and saying thanks and goodbye to Conner & Villanueva.

[bradshaw2ben]

Depending on where the salary cap comes in, this could be the last SB competitive Steelers team for a while. They are sitting at like $202 million against the cap next year with just 34 players under contract. Cap could drop below where it was this year meaning they’re already well over. JuJu, Dupree, Hilton, Sutton, Villanueva could all be gone and they’d still have to make significant cuts,

I think they need to cut Pouncey and Haden. Both are well into the downside of their careers. O line is a mess. Best case you have a Chuks and Banner at OT, maybe a draft pick. Decastro, Wisnewski and Dotson inside. Highsmith replaces Dupree, take the Haden money and give it to Sutton and Hilton.

The other alternative is to retire Ben and trade way up in the draft and rebuild.

First off, that $202 is a little deceiving. There's 0% chance Ben plays at that number. They can and most definitely will cut ~$12-15M from Ben's 2021 cap hit by writing him an extension. More if they rip up his current deal and write a new 5 year deal with in-season roster bonuses for later years (with the promise of converting salary to upfront bonus if he's still playing in 4 years.

Secondly, no way is Vance Macdonald wandering around looking lost on the football field for the Pittsburgh Steelers at $8M next year, so let's call the cap hit down to $180M. That's would probably allow them enough room to sign a rookie class and a few qualifying contract FAs (meaning roster-fllers/depth)

Next, the unused cap from this year rolls over. Right now that's $10M. It might not last if they have to make a major replacement in-season, but that would buy them $10M to re-sign players.

Next, TJ Watt has to be signed, but he already has a big cap hit for next year, $10,089,000. You might be able to sign him to 5/$125/50 guaranteed ish with a year one cap hit of ~$9M. that's a savings of 1M.

So, in the worst-case, lowball cap number, no relief for NFL teams that we don't yet know about... Steelers have circa $11M in cap hit to re-sign the folllowing starting players, with projected year 1 cap number in parenthesis:

Dupree ($8.5M)
JuJu ($11M if he has a big 2020, $9M if he underperforms)
Feiler ($3.1M)
Banner ($2M)
Hilton ($3.25M)
Sutton ($3.9M)
Conner ($1.9M)
AV ($7.2M)

Then there are the veteran players that you could consider parting ways with. With varying degrees of impact on the field and in the locker room, they'd be (cap savings wihtout them):

decastro: (8.75M)
Nelson (8.25M)
Pouncey (8M)
Haden (7M)
Vince W ($4M)
Wisniewski (1.4M)

Me? I'm looking to move Decastro after the season. There'd be a pretty good market for him and I'm sure he'd be amenable to a sign & trade. Win a SB this year, cash in with a new home for maybe his last payday.

I'd also think about cutting or moving Steven Nelson. He made a big imapct last year, but if it comes down to keeping Sutton/Hilton and plugging in Sutton or Layne or Pierre into the #2 CB spot, I go with youth.

I think extending Joe Haden is the better way to go, vs cutting him. He got 3 yrs/25 guaranteed last time, but he's 3 years older and with some signs of wear. Seems like the think to do is extend him with a deal you're only going to see to fruition if he looks fantastic after 2021. In the meantime, you save some against the cap.

Pouncey might think about hanging them up, but that only really helps the Steelers if they have a ready made replacement on the roster. There was talk of Dotson taking C snaps, but if you move Decastro, then you need him at G. Plus, you risk BEN retiring if Pouncey goes. I guess you could have Chuks-Feiler-Wis-Dotson-Banner/draft pick for pretty cheap and it might work. If you get a draft pick for Decastro or Pouncey (or Pouncey retires) + cut/trade Nelson & extend Haden, you have more than enough room to sign Dupree, Feiler, Banner, Hilton, & Sutton. you might even squeeze enough to re-sign AV instead of Banner + take a run at a mid-tier FA at WR or DL.

I truly think the hardest decisions they have to make are: sadly letting an extremely young JuJu walk, parting with one of their veteran IOL, parting with one of their veteran CBs. As long as they can do that, they can make it with the cap being as bad as advertised. If the cap goes up, they can probably sign JuJu OR keep one of those two vets.

[Kodiak]

I outlined a path in another thread. I think they can keep Dupree or JuJu without a huge upheaval, but keeping both would require some tough but reasonable moves. They can get under the cap and have enough room to sign rookies and filler FAs just by re-doing Ben's deal, walking away from McDonald, and saying thanks and goodbye to Conner & Villanueva.

And it remains to be seen what happens in 2021. I think the cap would bounce back to at least $205M. So you do something creative with a Dupree and JuJu contract where you guarantee the first 3 years, maybe along with additional guaranteed roster bonuses in 2021 and 2022 so you get their 2021 number as low as possible.

Hopefully they understand the situation, and if they really want to be a Steeler and contend for a championship they'll work with the team to get under the cap. Not asking them to give up money, really, just defer it a year because of the bizarre cap situation.

You can also get more money restructuring/extending Tuitt and Heyward. Colbert will have to reach deep into the bag of loopholes and tricks, but I'm sure it can be done.

[bradshaw2ben]

Hopefully the front office is making all these moves after winning a Lombardi--will make it all go down easier.

[SteelerDayTrader]

if the presumptive 2021 roster cluster looks like this:

QB - Ben (restructured) Biberty UDFA/later draft pick
RB - Snell McFarland Watt Samuels Smallwood
WR - Claypool DJ Washington Cain McCloud Darboh
TE - Gentry Top 100 draft pick Rader
OL - Top 100 draft pick Chuks DeCastro(restructured) Pouncey(restructured) Dotson Gray Hawkins Wisniewski Jones

DL - Cam Top 100 draft pick Tuitt Buggs Davis UDFA/later draft pick
ILB - VW(restructured) Bush UG3 Spillane
OLB - Watt Dupree Highsmith Elliot
S - Edmunds Fitzpatrick Allen Brooks
CB - Nelson Layne Haden(restructured) Pierre draft pick

IMO the only real emergency is TE.....DL probably isnt too far behind but a quality NT IS draftable outside the 1st......beyond that youd want some help at LT if no one emerges this year.....

so TE DL LT/C as draft priorities.....i dont think thats a bad roster.....might not be the best....but on paper i could see it doing fine

[Havoc]

Huge JW fan and I definitely don’t want to be too hard on him because he had a great night overall and his rapport with Ben is vastly improved from what it was 2 years ago.

But.....he should have caught that last pass from Ben. Because James hasn’t really shown the extra gear to run away from DB’s like he had at OSU (I’ll never understand where it went), his strength has become coming down with contested catches and he’s shown an amazing ability to do that.

Monday night on his final target, I believe Washington either took his eyes off the ball or never really got a good read on it in the first place. The DB never knocks that ball away from Washington if he gets his giant ass mitts on it cleanly.

If it's the play I'm thinking of, the DB got his hand in there and prevented the catch. I understand combat catches but it's a different matter when a DB gets his hand inside the catch zone and knocks it away. Sometimes the opposition makes plays too (as Scunge said).

On another note, I was disappointed with DJ. I think he will be a good player for us but I also think we might have overrated his talent level a little and I was wondering about that even before this game.

I think people (or at least me, anyway) are rating DJ based on his potential. He has all the tools, and has flashed. It's impossible to tell if he will develop into an AB or Julio Jones, but he certainly has the skill set and physical ability. At least to me, anyway.

I was thinking he's not as quick as Holmes in the open field but nevermind, he's quick enough to make people miss in a broken field.

DJ has great potential.

Liking what we are seeing from Claypool. As advertised so far.

[Scunge]

When I said DJ reminds me of the best parts of Louis Lipps for example, I say that in how they deceptively don't look to be running fast. They used to describe Lipps as a glider, just this effortless smooth way of running. Also, I think DJ played with a sports hernia last year didn't he? Who knows if that impacted his ability to work out in the months leading up to the draft and during the season. I think he is in that 4.45-4.50 area in terms of timed speed but he plays faster than that and his quickness and lateral agility is off the charts.

In terms of his fumbling, look, Antonio Brown had 4 fumbles in his 3rd season. Tyreek Hill fumbled 6 times his first two years, Jarvis Landry fumbled 7 times for Miami as a rookie. DeSean Jackson fumbled 11 times his first 3 years. The Bills traded for Stephon Diggs and he fumbled 4 times last season for Minnesota.

I think it takes time for the smaller WRs to adjust to the NFL game in terms of ball security. Steve Smith of Carolina, remember him? He fumbled 8 times as a rookie and then 5 times in his 2nd year, and then another 5 fumbles in his 3rd year. So, 18 fumbles in his first 3 years.

I bring up Smith purposely to illustrate how stupid some of this rhetoric is about how DJ better get that fumbling under control or he will find himself on the bench bullshit. Right. Did Carolina put Smith on the bench after he continued to fumble his first 3 seasons? Did Buffalo hesitate to get Diggs, were they worried about his fumbling?

Fumbles happen and it happens to everybody, I am just pragmatic about it. What was funny, just the other day I was listening to Tunch and Wolf and they were talking about how Benny should talk to Jerome Bettis about how not to fumble. Were they joking? They pointed out the obvious fumble against Indy but how he was so secure otherwise with the ball to which I was scratching my head in disbelief.

Jerome Bettis fumbled 13 times in his first two seasons as a Pittsburgh Steeler. Funny how people will have this selective amnesia? when talking of past players and their accomplishments. Adrian Peterson, no I am not comparing Snell to him, but he had 20 fumbles his first 3 seasons.

The reality of the NFL is that players fumble, even great Hall of Fame players fumble. Yeah, it would be great for Snell, or DJ or Conner to only have 1 fumble per season but how realistic is that??

[K_C_]

I like James Washington, just too many other targets and JW doesn't seem to have a ton of chemistry with Ben.

But I don't know how Claypool doesn't start gobbling up snaps. Can't keep him off the field, and that's going to make JW the odd man out.

Washington's chemistry with Ben is LOADS better than it was 2 years ago, when it looked like they weren't even playing the same sport.

JW is making important catches and a nice impact, but in both games he had a concentration lapse that caused a drop (last week's wasn't so bad, but it's still a play he should be expected to make).

Diontae right now, is the guy who is struggling either with his chemistry with Ben, or some type of confidence issue. He'll make a nice play, then do something REALLY stupid. It's also possible Diontae is simply thinking/playing too fast. Looking to hit a home run before the pitch gets to the plate.

Not worried about Washington. He's coming along nicely and I expect he'll get his concentration issues worked out. In a long season, we're going to need all of our receivers. Washington included. Having 4 REALLY good receivers is a phenomenal problem to have.

Diontae, probably our singularly most talented receiver, has a shit ton to work on.

The more I see, I expect the Steelers to re-sign Watt and JuJu and let Dupree leave via free agency.

I believe they'll make an attempt to sign Dupree, but he'll get a ridiculous contract elsewhere.

JuJu though......dude just makes too many plays to let him leave and when Denver did their best to take him away, the other receivers were inconsistent.

What's a ridiculous contract for Dupree? He's playing like a top 5 EDGE right now. If you can get him for less than Myles Garrett, Bosa, Watt, Mack AND structure the deal with a low year 1 cap hit, you have to do it. He's inarguably been their best defensive player in the first two games. JuJu is one of many good players on defense, and it would suck to lose him considering how young he is... but that's a no-brainer to me.

I probably should have made myself more clear.

While I believe Watt and JuJu will want enormous contracts, I also believe both REALLY want to remain Steelers. I don't believe both are looking for hometown discounts, but if it's close, both are going to opt to stay with the Steelers. No doubt in my mind.

I don't feel the same way about Dupree. A friend of mine knows Bud a little bit and has told me before that he expects Dupree will leave. Kind of insinuated that Dupree is the type of guy who will not only want more money than Watt, but will also want to go elsewhere to show folks his success has nothing to do with playing on the other side of TJ.

I hope this dude is wrong, but don't be surprised if Dupree is actually looking to go elsewhere, if he can.

So I guess we'll see what happens with Dupree, because Watt IS going to be the Steelers first priority and I'm not sure that's going to tickle Bud's fancy.

[Havoc]

When I said DJ reminds me of the best parts of Louis Lipps for example, I say that in how they deceptively don't look to be running fast. They used to describe Lipps as a glider, just this effortless smooth way of running. Also, I think DJ played with a sports hernia last year didn't he? Who knows if that impacted his ability to work out in the months leading up to the draft and during the season. I think he is in that 4.45-4.50 area in terms of timed speed but he plays faster than that and his quickness and lateral agility is off the charts.

Sorry to chop your post Scunge, want to comment on this.

Lipps is 23rd all time in PR avg (minimum 75 returns) on the ranking linked below.

I'll go back even further and add Lynn Swann to the discussion. Swann would be 6th all time but his 61 punt returns were 14 short of the minimum for this ranking. Swann's broken field running was probably more like Lipps, less like Holmes/AB.

DJ reminds me of prime Bell with his lightening quick sudden seeming out of nowhere side to side bursts, with enough top end to get downfield. Fun to watch.

https://www.footballdb.com/leaders/care ... ns-average

[Scunge]

Louis Lipps had a chance to be really special but that damn Chicago Bears defense literally wrecked him in his 3rd season. He was never the same player after that game. Even Art Modell at the time was livid about how the Bears defense went overboard in that game in targeting Lipps.

Lipps as a punt returner, he really only did it those first two years, 89 of his returns came in those first two years.

He was the first punt returner that I can remember that would take his eyes off the football as it was in the air, so that he could scan the field to see where the would be tacklers were closing in on him. He would do this not once, but multiple times. I remember one game they did a closeup of him, on his face and showed him taking his eyes off the ball, lower his head and scan the field, then make contact with the ball, then do it again and again and again, I counted 4 times that he did this on one single return. He had 53 returns for 656 yards and a TD as a rookie. He just refused to call for fair catches, always wanted to take the ball and return it. If I remember right that 656 punt return yards established the NFL's rookie record at the time.

Anyway, our return game this year is the best I have seen it in decades!!! I feel like every game we have a chance of legitimately scoring on a punt or kick return. DJ, Ray Ray and we have Anthony McFarland waiting in the wings on Kick Returns too. Also, Smallwood on the PS has an NFL kick return TD on his resume. It is an embarrassment of riches for our return game

[Pabst]

Anyway, our return game this year is the best I have seen it in decades!!! I feel like every game we have a chance of legitimately scoring on a punt or kick return. DJ, Ray Ray and we have Anthony McFarland waiting in the wings on Kick Returns too. Also, Smallwood on the PS has an NFL kick return TD on his resume. It is an embarrassment of riches for our return game

Probably not a coincidence that this is the deepest the Steelers' skill positions have been in a long time ("deep", not "best").

Honestly, with the exception of a few spots (NT, S) this is the deepest team we've seen in quite a while.

[Scunge]

You want to know something Pabst? NT may actually be a deep position for us.

I thought it would be rough replacing Hargrave this year. So far it has been easy. Tyson Alualu is playing like Kimo Von Oelhoffen. Playing like that perfect crafty old veteran. You look at this past game, Tyson had a sack and then followed it up on the next play with a batted down pass. When Isaiah Buggs comes on in relief I have been impressed with his strong play. Carlos Davis the rookie is a stud athlete, running a low 4.82 40 at 312 pounds?

My ideas of letting JuJu walk, of letting Conner walk, of even being forced to let Dupree walk, well maybe it will be just as easy replacing them too. Maybe we should trust Colbert, have faith that Chase Claypool, Alex Highsmith and Benny Snell and Anthony McFarland can step up and do the job too.

[Havoc]

Since we have become the WR factory and we have waited many years for great OLB play to return to us, I now might be more concerned about losing Dupree than losing JuJu which is a stunning reversal of recent memory. Let's see how the season plays out though.

Conner is replaceable and has had trouble staying healthy. Effective player when he's healthy. Soft hands in the receiving game.