Things aren’t looking all that promising for the Pittsburgh Steelers right now, not after trading wide receiver George Pickens to the Dallas Cowboys, opening up a hole on the roster, and certainly not as they continue to wait for a decision from 41-year-old quarterback Aaron Rodgers.
The Steelers were a playoff team last year, and at one point looked like one of the best teams in the NFL, sitting at 10-3 and rolling right along with one of the league’s highest-scoring offenses.
Then it all came crashing down, the Steelers losing four straight regular-season games to end the year and then getting blown out in the Wild Card, ending a once-promising season in ugly fashion.
Though the Steelers made some intriguing roster additions this offseason, like wide receiver DK Metcalf and cornerback Darius Slay, not to mention a promising rookie class, the Steelers have seemingly taken a step back in the AFC.
For ESPN’s Mike Clay, he projects the Steelers to miss the playoffs, though he has them still “very much in the conversation” among a handful of teams.
In the AFC, Clay has the Baltimore Ravens, Buffalo Bills, Kansas City Chiefs, Houston Texans, Denver Broncos, Cincinnati Bengals and New England Patriots making the playoffs, which would clearly knock the Steelers out.
Clay does have the Steelers in the conversation though, with the likes of the Los Angeles Chargers, Miami Dolphins and Indianapolis Colts, making for a potentially crowded playoff picture in the AFC.
A jump from a 4-13 season into the playoffs by the Patriots would be a significant move, but the Broncos and Bengals wouldn’t be a surprise. The Broncos made the playoffs last season and had a strong offseason, while the Bengals started slow and finished with a flurry, but a 9-8 record wasn’t good enough to get in.
Outside of those three Wild Card teams, the rest of the AFC seems like a relative lock with the Ravens, Bills and Chiefs as the big three in the conference, while the Texans could win a relatively weak AFC South.
For the Steelers, they’ll need a lot to go right again in 2025. There are some concerns offensively, not just at quarterback. Clay ranks the Steelers’ QB at No. 22 in the NFL, the RBs at No. 29, the WRs at 14 and the TEs at No. 5. Not great!
The defense should be strong once again, especially with the addition of Slay to shore up cornerback, and the addition of rookies Derrick Harmon and Yahya Black along the defensive line, addressing key areas of need for the Black and Gold.
But there was a lot of turnover offensively, and the presumed starting quarterback in Rodgers hasn’t even signed yet, leaving things up in the air for the Steelers under head coach Mike Tomlin. That uncertainty, and a decline in some talent on the offensive side of the football — at least on paper — has many believing the Steelers won’t be a playoff team, including Clay.
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