4 Steelers who deserve contract extensions (and 2 who don’t)
The Pittsburgh Steelers are expected to have over $78 million in salary cap space to work with next offseason, according to Over the Cap, but that money is going to deplete quickly. During the 2024 offseason, the Steelers didn’t have any notable free agents who needed to be retained. The opposite can be said when looking ahead to the 2025 offseason.
Pittsburgh is projected to have numerous pivotal staters hitting the free agent market while others enter the final year of their contracts and will need an extension. Unfortunately, the front office won’t have the funds to retain every player, so some business moves will need to be made.
Some of these decisions of which players to retain and who to let walk away will be easy for the team. Others will leave them scratching their heads. Here are four Steelers who deserve contract extensions and two who don’t in 2025.
This one is about as easy as it gets. T.J. Watt has been the face of the franchise since his second season in the league in 2018 when he quickly emerged as the best player on the team. It was a no-brainer decision to make Watt the highest-paid defender in the NFL during the 2021 offseason, and the Steelers will have to fork up big again for him on a contract extension next offseason.
Watt turns 30 during the 2024 season, but they can’t let a generational player walk away when he could still have a few seasons left in the tank as one of the most impactful defenders in the game.
Game after game and snap after snap, Jaylen Warren has proven that he’s a player willing to put his body on the line for the sake of the team. Warren is the best undrafted free-agent gem the Pittsburgh Steelers have found in quite some time, and with only 226 NFL carries under his belt, there’s still plenty of fuel left in the tank.
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