It’s no surprise that the NFL trade deadline is on Election Day. I felt the same way I did when I left my local polling place and saw who the Steelers were eyeing to fill their wide receiver needs.
Overwhelmed by choices and unfulfilled by the process.
Leave it to the political reporters to weigh in on the state of the White House and democracy. But as for the Steelers’ wide receiver room, the best I can say is that it’s been slightly upgraded with the addition of Mike Williams from the New York Jets on Tuesday. He provides size beyond the numbers and some depth in case George Pickens gets injured.
From a political perspective, the Steelers couldn’t completely flip the swing state on Tuesday, even with the addition of edge rusher Preston Smith from the Green Bay Packers. They have only softened their position in the battleground of the AFC.
If healthy (which is a big deal, considering he’s struggled with hip and knee issues throughout his career), the 6-foot-4, 218-pound Williams will be a good fit for coordinator Arthur Smyth due to his size. He could add a big threat to the US passing attack. The concern is that after joining the Jets this offseason, Williams did little in New York with Aaron Rodgers at quarterback. Williams, 30, had just 12 catches for 166 yards and one touchdown.
Indeed, Williams played behind other wide receivers like Garrett Wilson, Allen Lazard, and eventually Davante Adams. However, I’m sorry if you’re not planning a Super Bowl parade in Pittsburgh since the Steelers just acquired the Jets’ fourth-best wideout.
To me, the addition of Williams feels like little more than a face-saver for Steelers general manager Omar Khan. The organization has had a number of swings and misses as it attempts to backfill the position after trading away Diontae Johnson in March.
Since the spring, the Steelers have been rumored to be in talks with clubs for every wide receiver, from Adams to Cooper Kupp, Christian Kirk, Darius Slayton, Adam Thielen and Courtland Sutton. Most notably, the organization was unable to finalize a trade and signing of Brandon Aiyuk with San Francisco in August.
People even thought the Steelers might try to re-acquire Johnson from Carolina until the whole world learned that NFL rules didn’t allow it.
The recent stories about Kirk are my favorite. Last weekend, ESPN’s Adam Schefter reported that the Steelers were “in advanced negotiations” to sign Kirk, and that until Kirk was acquired, “there’s a good chance the Jaguars wide receiver ends up in Pittsburgh.” It was reported that. I broke my collarbone on October 27th.
It certainly was. Of course it was.
Oh, those poor star-bearing Steelers! They were on the verge of acquiring a receiver until the cruel football gods intervened and Kirk suffered a season-ending injury.
Hmm! please. If the Steelers really wanted Kirk and preferred him over Williams, he would have been here two weeks ago.
This is probably a fluffy, leaked version of what was happening to make it seem like the Steelers were going to better address the hole they created for themselves at that position until bad luck got in the way. I feel like that.
Mr. Schefter was undoubtedly right, and there were conversations going on between Pittsburgh and Jacksonville. But if the negotiations were as close as we were led to believe, why was Kirk playing for the 2-6 Jaguars that day? Why didn’t he suffer some kind of injury, like Johnson before he eventually went to Baltimore, or like Adams, who was in Las Vegas for a few weeks before being traded to New York?
That’s probably because the Steelers and Jags are still negotiating and posturing over mid-draft compensation.
Now, with Kirk now on Jacksonville’s injured reserve list, the Steelers needed to acquire a player the Jets wanted to keep for just half the season.
It’s not exactly a change of scenery in the middle of the season.
Getting Williams is better than nothing. He may still have the size and speed to offset Pickens’ potential short-term injury. He also could allow Pickens to become a bigger threat in other parts of the field as well as a deep shooting advantage from the sideline.
The Johnson and Donte Jackson trade looks great for Kern when evaluated solely based on the original exchange with the Panthers. But unfortunately for Kern, those opinions will change if Johnson helps the Ravens in a big way and Williams is only a close second in Pittsburgh.
Mike Williams is not the candidate most of us wanted, but he is now the candidate we must support.
Do you feel familiar?
Tim Benz is a Tribune-Review staff writer. You can contact Tim at tbenz@triblive.com or via X. All Tweets may be reposted. All emails will be made public unless otherwise specified.
