No more prognosticating, the Pittsburgh Steelers roster is now down to 53 players after final roster cuts were made on Tuesday. And on the whole, there weren't a number of surprises. Perhaps the biggest was not just trading Kendrick Green but also parting with Kevin Dotson as well. Aside from that, it was as expected.
In some cases, that's a good thing. When you look at a Steelers position group like the wide receivers, there weren't a ton of tough decisions to be made because of the talent in the room. However, there are some positions where, even though the starters look great, the bottom of the depth chart is lacking -- there just weren't any better options.
Looking through the 53 players on the roster, these three stick out as players who made the final cut, but didn't necessarily fully deserve their spot outside of there not being a better option, which is not indicative of their own play.
NFL Rumors: 3 Steelers who made the 53-man roster but don't deserve it
3. James Pierre, CB
You'd be hard-pressed to find a player who made a 53-man roster for the 2023 season who performed worse in the preseason than Steelers cornerback James Pierre.
Already playing with the backups (and largely against backups), Pierre was ostensibly picked on throughout the preseason, allowing 12 catches on the 14 times he was targeted for 152 yards while also allowing a touchdown. He was consistently getting torched whenever he took the field.
Pierre does have some familiarity in Pittsburgh and has played decently on special teams in his career, but nothing he's shown so far this year says that he's going to have a positive impact on the defense this year.
If rookie cornerback Cory Trice hadn't gone down early in the offseason with a season-ending injury, there's a good argument to be made that the Purdue product would be on the 53-man roster over Pierre. But with an overall lack of depth in camp at the position, the veteran earned the spot.
However, you do have to wonder if that will be for long after the Steelers added former Cowboys cornerback Anthony Brown to their practice squad on Wednesday. Maybe, maybe not -- but nothing Pierre has put on the field this preseason was worthy of making the roster.
2. Montravius Adams, DL
Unlike Pierre, nothing that we saw from veteran defensive tackle Montravius Adams in the preseason and heard out of training camp indicated that the former Packer was an outright disaster. In fact, he was solid, which has long been the case for the Auburn product in the NFL. He's never been spectacular, but he's been a fine plug-and-play asset on the defensive front.
That, to me, is why it's a bit surprising that Adams got the nod. He was already essentially usurped on the depth chart when Keeanu Benton came into the fold at the nose tackle spot, but there were two big-time challengers on the camp roster that seemed to have some real upside for the Steelers in Armon Watts (who made the roster) and Breiden Fehoko (who was cut) that you could've argued would have had a potentially bigger impact in a rotational role than Adams is likely to.
At the same time, you can understand why Adams was kept on the roster. He's been praised this offseason for his veteran leadership, even while getting passed up on the depth chart. Subsequently, from a coaching staff perspective of making these decisions, you have to like keeping a locker room leader in the building.
For me sitting at my desk chair and not in the locker room, though, I'm always for changing it up and going for upside when it comes to the depth, particularly on the defensive front. That's why I would argue that Adams was less deserving than others, though his inclusion on the 53-man roster was far less egregious than the other two players on this list.
1. Mason Rudolph, QB
If anyone can offer me a legitimate reason as to why Mason Rudolph is still a member of the Pittsburgh Steelers, I'm all ears. The only thing that I can come up with is that they think that maybe, possibly, a desperate team at quarterback could be looking to trade for their third-stringer. Outside of that, there's no real feasible reason for him to be on this team.
Last offseason, it made sense for the Steelers to keep three quarterbacks with Rudolph, Mitch Trubisky and rookie Kenny Pickett. Even though they obviously believed in Pickett enough to make him the only quarterback picked in the first round of the draft, the uncertainty of starting a rookie made it viable to have two veteran options on the depth chart.
But Pickett took over the offense, made some nice progression as a rookie on the field, and now appears to be ready to have the training wheels taken off. And with Trubisky entrenching himself as the QB2 on the depth chart, that makes Rudolph, a player who has been middling at best when he's seen the field in his career, expendable.
Keeping another player at virtually any position would've been a better route to go than keeping a third quarterback on the 53-man roster, something we see far fewer teams do every single year. Rudolph offers little to no value for the Steelers with this now being Pickett's team and with a backup ahead of him. And if injuries crop up, it'd be hard to imagine that Rudolph wouldn't be among the first options to be cut loose to make room for any signings.
