Cautiously optimistic is the way I would describe my feelings about the Pittsburgh Steelers in the upcoming season. A worse version of this team found a way to go 10-7 and sneak into the playoffs in 2023.
On paper, this team is better at multiple positions and worse at only one. Not exactly a recipe for doom and gloom, but for some beat writers, it is all they know.
Steelers writer Mark Madden offered up about as gloomy an outlook as we’ve seen. But amidst his pessimistic diatribe was one piece of information that we felt we needed to cover.
Madden offered up this tidbit about new Steelers cornerback Donte Jackson.
Carolina was about to cut Donte Jackson. Until they traded him to the Steelers for wideout Diontae Johnson. The Steelers immediately made Jackson a starter. A cornerback that a 2-15 team was about to ditch.
This is true, and it really does make you wonder if the aggressive nature of general manager Omar Khan got the best of him here.
If Jackson isn’t as good at cornerback as Diontae Johnson would have been at wide receiver, as Madden says, this team is now shorthanded at two key positions.
Most of what Madden had to say was just vitriol aimed at the franchise, but the Johnson-Jackson trade is going to cast a huge shadow over this team if Jackson struggles and the offense can’t get on track.
