Pittsburgh Steelers GM Omar Khan didn’t sugarcoat things last week at the 2026 NFL Scouting Combine when asked about the performance at the wide receiver position in 2025.
Outside of DK Metcalf — who was a bit of a disappointment in his own right — the Steelers got very little out of their wide receiver room in 2025. Late in the year, the Steelers relied on Adam Thielen and Marquez Valdes-Scantling to give them a boost.
“I don’t think we were good enough, overall,” Khan told reporters, including our own Ross McCorkle and Joe Clark, at the Combine. “We didn’t win a single playoff game. That’s not good enough. So we have to be better at every position.”
Now, with the start of free agency under two weeks away, the Steelers are back in a familiar position: needing to address the receiver room in a major way, this time under first-year head coach Mike McCarthy.
Fortunately for the Steelers, there are plenty of big-name wide receivers set to hit the open market, led by the likes of Mike Evans, Alec Pierce, Romeo Doubs, Wan’Dale Robinson, and Rashid Shaheed.
The Steelers could just wait and address the position via the 2026 NFL Draft, which offers a deep, talented wide receiver crop. But if they address the position in free agency first, they’ll find themselves up against stiff competition.
According to ESPN’s Jeremy Fowler, the Buffalo Bills are the team to watch at receiver in free agency.
“Rival teams expect Buffalo to strongly address wide receiver in the coming weeks,” Fowler writes. “And multiple league executives are linking Rashid Shaheed or Romeo Doubs to the Bills. Alec Pierce will most likely be out of their price range.”
Shaheed and Doubs both make sense for the Bills, who need to find a leading receiver for star quarterback Josh Allen. Keon Coleman has been a borderline bust, and Khalil Shakir is a very good player but more of a No. 2 than anything.
It’s rather fitting that a team the Steelers haven’t been able to solve in recent years in the Bills just so happens to be a team they’ll find themselves negotiating against on the open market at a position of need.
When it comes to wide receivers like Doubs and Shaheed, the Steelers have been connected to them in the past. Doubs is a player quarterback Aaron Rodgers reportedly inquired about last summer and has been connected to the Steelers since the season ended, while Pittsburgh showed interest in Shaheed at the trade deadline before he landed with Seattle.
The Bills might not be the only competition for Shaheed, either, according to Fowler.
“Some around the league are linking Shaheed to the Raiders,” Fowler writes. “The feeling is that Las Vegas likes him a lot, though it will be selective at the position if the money gets too out of hand.”
With his great long speed and ability as a game-changing kick and punt returner, Shaheed should have a lucrative market. He’d be a nice fit in Pittsburgh opposite Metcalf, giving the Steelers a true field stretcher and a guy who can hit the home run after the catch, all while giving special teams a major boost.
But many teams see him that way, and with the Raiders having hired former Seattle OC Klint Kubiak as their new head coach, a landing spot in Sin City makes a great deal of sense.
So, it might be difficult for the Steelers to sign one of the top names at receiver in free agency due to the competition, but Khan should be able to land a solid No. 2 or No. 3 WR on the open market, setting Pittsburgh up to swing big in the draft.
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