The 2026 NFL Scouting Combine is underway, and the Pittsburgh Steelers have a large contingent of front office personnel in Indianapolis once again for a busy week filled with player interviews and on-field workouts.
The Combine marks a major part of the pre-draft schedule as things really start to ramp up after players go through measurements, medical checks, on-field workouts and formal and informal meetings. It can all be a whirlwind.
For Steelers GM Omar Khan, who sat down with Steelers Audio Network play-by-play broadcaster Rob King on Steelers.com, the Combine is critical to shaping Pittsburgh’s draft board.
“I’ve said this publicly about trying to identify guys that are Steelers, that are for us. Certain players might not fit what we want as a guy to be a Steeler, but it might fit somewhere else,” Khan said of the importance of the Combine. “And what that means, it’s sometimes hard to explain ’cause there’s so many characteristics and traits of what we want a Steeler to be and to look like. But when you’re in this, you just sort of know. So for me, being here in the interview process, watching these guys, how they interact when they don’t know they’re being necessarily filmed and just seeing that and obviously working out, it’s all part of it.
“Just really getting ’em and see if they’re meant to be Pittsburgh Steelers.”
Khan has been big during his tenure as Steelers GM on finding and landing those players the organization deems Steelers. It’s something that former head coach Mike Tomlin talked about a lot during the pre-draft process as the organization tried to identify players who had the physical traits and also the personal traits and the mannerisms that match what the organization is all about.
That can be tough to determine in short interviews and quick interactions in hallways and on the field before workouts. But the Steelers have been able to lay a foundation during the Combine in recent years under Khan, which has led to plenty of success in the draft year after year.
As Khan stated, there’s just a feel to it with the players. You know it when you see it and feel it, and the Steelers have had a certain style of player and person they’ve targeted over the years. They’ll be searching for more of the same this week in Indianapolis.
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