Steelers Now
With George Pickens off to Dallas, the Pittsburgh Steelers are counting on second-year wide receiver Roman Wilson to make a Year 2 jump, according to Jeremy Fowler of ESPN.
Fowler notes that Wilson looks like a different player this offseason, compared from his injury riddled rookie campaign.
Along with Wilson, the Steelers’ wide receivers room includes DK Metcalf, Calvin Austin III, Robert Woods, Ben Skowronek, Scotty Miller, Lance McCutcheon, Brandon Johnson, Ke’Shawn Williams and Roc Taylor. To say the least, the Steelers’ current crop of wide receivers leaves a lot to be desired.
The Steelers could bolster the WR corps via a free agent signing or trade, but Wilson definitely needs to live up to his third-round pedigree regardless.
On Pittsburgh's offense, post-Pickens trade:
–#Steelers remain in contact with Aaron Rodgers and are hopeful that he'll be a Steeler. But, as of now, no hard update.
-Team counting on Roman Wilson Year 2 jump. This offseason he looks like a different player than from his…— Jeremy Fowler (@JFowlerESPN) May 7, 2025
Steelers head coach Mike Tomlin gave an in-depth answer when asked about wide receiver Roman Wilson’s lack of playing time in 2024, despite being healthy near the end of the season.
As a rookie, Wilson played just five snaps of in-game action. He didn’t appear on the stat sheet and was placed on injured reserve with a second ailment in late October. Despite being designated to return before the Steelers’ regular-season finale, he remained on the list the rest of the way.
“He was healthy, but healthy and football readiness were two different things, to be quite honest with you,” Tomlin said at the NFL owner’s meetings in March. “When you’re coming back from injury, you’re essentially getting on a moving train, is the analogy that I like to use, and we talk about a guy that had very little NFL experience, and so he was healthy at the end of the year. He was working extremely hard in practice, but a real avenue never presented itself due to the misfortune of others, or what have you for him to contribute. But we’re expecting really good things for him in his second year. I think that’s a reasonable expectation. I think from time to time, guys get faced with injury and it derails their start, but by no means do we feel like it’s going to define his career. Calvin Austin is an example of that. Calvin missed a significant portion of his rookie year, similar to Roman, and over the last two years, he’s gone on to move away from that, to be a real positive contributor to our efforts, and we expect some of those things from Roman.”
Wilson had a standout collegiate career at Michigan. He had 1,707 receiving yards and 20 touchdowns on 107 grabs for the Wolverines. He dropped just one pass on that level, a consistent nature the Steelers were hoping to benefit from.
“He’s got...
