Mueller: Steelers betting on conservative approach to replacing Stephon Tuitt
I give Stephon Tuitt a lot of credit. He chose family over football. It could not have been easy for him.
Tuitt retired Wednesday, just nine days after his 29th birthday, and after an entire year away from the Steelers, an absence brought about because of the tragic hit-and-run incident that killed his brother, Richard.
I can’t fathom what he and his mother – who was present when her son was struck and killed – have gone through in the year since. That kind of tragedy and trauma fundamentally changes people, and it clearly rearranged Tuitt’s priorities. It’s pretty easy to understand that playing an inherently violent, risky game suddenly became less of an imperative for Tuitt.
The Steelers deserve credit, too, for trying to do right by the player right up until the end. Not every team would have kept him around and allowed him to go out on his own terms.
That said, Tuitt’s decision and the Steelers’ willingness to accommodate him while he made it has left the team in a potentially precarious position, one that has the potential to make Kevin Colbert, Mike Tomlin, Omar Khan and the rest of the front office look like geniuses, or like dopes.
It’s by no means a guarantee or even a likelihood that a player like Akiem Hicks would have chosen to go to the Steelers in free agency; the team is in a period of transition, and Hicks took an incentive-filled deal to join the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, who are once again a Super Bowl contender after Tom Brady’s vanishingly brief retirement.
Whether or not Hicks would have wanted to play here is a moot point, however, because the Steelers did nothing in free agency to prepare for the possibility that Tuitt would retire. We have no indication that they pursued any available defensive linemen, and while they could still grab a cap casualty a few months from now, Hicks was the cream of the available crop.
Instead, the franchise brain trust did what they so often do; trust the players on hand and try to fortify through the draft. Texas A&M’s DeMarvin Leal is an intriguing third-round pick, but he doesn’t quite have the body type that made Tuitt so special.
Isaiahh Loudermilk has bulked up, to reportedly the neighborhood of 305 pounds, but he represents an interesting case; a player many others thought would land as a priority undrafted free agent, but whom the Steelers thought so highly of that they traded a 2022 fourth-round pick to grab him in the fifth round in 2021.
Colbert and Tomlin saw something they loved back then, and though Loudermilk played sparingly as a rookie, and with mixed results, it’s a safe bet that the Steelers expect a major jump in year two. In fact, my guess is that they think he can be a starter and major contributor as a 3-4 defensive end; otherwise, why pick him?
Chris Wormley is still around, and while he had a career-high seven sacks last year, after tallying just 3.5 in his first four seasons, he is viewed as a mediocre-to-poor run defender. You will recall that the Steelers were dead last against the run last year, a major reason they struggled so badly overall on defense.
Montravius Adams and Henry Mondeaux are two other names I am contractually obligated to mention as being possible contributors, but they feel like more fringe guys than anything else.
Point is, the Steelers had to know that it was possible that Tuitt wouldn’t come back, no matter how much internal optimism they had, and they chose to mostly stand pat. None of the players mentioned is a true proven commodity, or particularly close to it. If Tuitt was one dollar, the Steelers are trying to replace him with what looks like sixty-five cents on paper.
It might work out for them. Loudermilk might turn into a stud. Leal might be a quick study and prove wrong those who saw him as a tweener. Tyson Alualu’s return might make some of this moot, as he can be a dominant force alongside Cam Heyward if healthy. In fact, if I had to guess, the team’s faith in Alualu is a big reason why they didn’t try to go bolder and use some of their ample cap room to get a Tuitt insurance policy.
Perhaps the Steelers will roll the dice on Larry Ogunjobi, who was very good for Cincinnati before an injury in the playoffs that ended his year and required surgery, but the Bears backed out of a lucrative deal with Ogunjobi because he didn’t pass their physical. Any team bringing him on might reap the benefits, but it would be a clear case of buyer beware.
If not Ogunjobi, maybe it will be an aforementioned cap casualty later on. Or maybe the Steelers will see what they have during training camp, decide they like it, and stand pat. That’s what I’d wager will happen, and if it does, they had better hope their evaluations are correct, because otherwise there will be a gaping hole that they could have done much more to fill.
This article originally appeared on Beaver County Times: Mueller: Steelers betting on conservative approach to replacing Tuitt
