As the Pittsburgh Steelers and Green Bay Packers get set to square off in their preseason opener on Thursday night, both teams are hoping that they can start gathering information that will help them make some tough roster decisions. Preseason games certainly don’t tell us everything — it’s mostly backups executing mostly vanilla schemes, after all — but live environments go a long way to determining which players hang on to spots on the final 53 and which don’t.
Even before game action begins, though, both of these storied franchises have some outstanding items on their offseason to-do list — and some intriguing talent remains on the open market that could help check those boxes. Here’s one free agent that each team needs to make between now and Week 1, regardless of how things play out on Thursday night.
Packers: EDGE Haason Reddick
There’s no two ways around it: The Packers’ pass rush situation simply is not good enough for a team with legitimate Super Bowl aspirations. Of course, there’s a Micah Parsons-shaped elephant in the room here, so it’s not as though Green Bay needs to completely throw caution to the wind to try and add more EDGE talent. But we still don’t yet know exactly when Parsons will be back or what he’ll look like right away, and the current top five of Lukas Van Ness, Barryn Sorrell, Brenton Cox Jr., Dani Dennis-Sutton and Collin Oliver doesn’t inspire a ton of confidence.
So why not kick the tires on a player who already has experience with new DC Jonathan Gannon? Reddick and Gannon overlapped in Philadelphia in 2022, a season in which the former posted a career-high 16 sacks while helping the Eagles get all the way to the Super Bowl. Reddick’s play fell off a cliff not long after, and there’s plenty of baggage here — baggage that helps explain why he’s still unsigned in mid-August, and that Gannon may not want any part of. But on the field, he could absolutely help bring some needed juice even in a designated pass rush role, as Green Bay looks to hold down the fort until Parsons is back to his old self.
Steelers: S Donovan Wilson
The Steelers seem to be all too aware that their safety depth is a concern, which is why they brought Wilson — who spent some time under Mike McCarthy with the Dallas Cowboys — for a workout last week and why they recently signed journeyman Rayshawn Jenkins. But it’s hard to have a ton of confidence in Jenkins as a regular contributor, considering that he’s now 32 and is on his third team in as many years.
Wilson, on the other hand, has been Mr. Reliable as a box safety over the last few years, and he would be a boon to a room that right now is relying on DeShon Elliott and Jaquan Brisker far more than any contender should. Wilson isn’t a star, but he’s one of the most proven free agents remaining who should still have some gas left in the tank, and he could stabilize a position of real need.
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