Blueprint For Success: How the Steelers were built (and what the Dolphins can learn)

This is the seventh in a series that examines how Miami’s 2019 opponents built their rosters, and what lessons the Dolphins can glean as they build theirs.

Team: Pittsburgh Steelers.

Coach: Mike Tomlin (13th season).

General manager: Kevin Colbert (10th season).

Team owner: The Rooney family.

Franchise value: $2.8 billion.

2018 record: 9-6-1 (second in the AFC North).

Last playoff appearance: 2017 (lost in the Divisional Round).

Last Super Bowl championship: 2008.

Total 2019 payroll: $207.5 million (fifth).

Total 2019 AAV: $190.5 million (14th).

Salary cap space: $2.1 million (31st).

Dead money: $28.8 million (sixth most).

Percentage of homegrown players: 60.

Overview: The Steelers are an empire in decline. For the past 15 years, they were consistently one of the best teams in the NFL, but the bill has finally come due. They went all-in on 2019, hoping to win a Super Bowl before Ben Roethlisberger’s window closes for good. They built one of the league’s most expensive rosters, spending more than a fifth of a billion dollars this year despite carrying a $21 million dead-cap figure. And then, Roethlisberger got hurt. He’s out for the season with a bad elbow, meaning more than $65 million of their roughly $205 million in 2019 salary cap liabilities is either on IR or accounted for by dead money. And the news gets no better next offseason. According to Spotrac, the Steelers have only an estimated $3 million in 2020 cap space, with $110 million in liabilities tied up in Roethlisberger, Stephon Tuitt, David DeCastro, Cameron Heyward, Joe Haden, Maurkice Pouncey and Steven Nelson. In other words, a lot of familiar names will be gone six months from now. But that might not be a bad thing. Thanks to good drafting, there’s a succession plan. Colbert seemed to plan for the end of the Killer B’s era, taking wide receiver JuJu Smith-Schuster and running back James Conner (who replaced the disgruntled Le’Veon Bell) in 2017 and quarterback Mason Rudolph in 2018. All three should start Monday night.

The lesson: Always have a Plan B. And keep drafting quarterbacks, even if you have a future Hall of Famer on your roster. But also understand the NFL is cyclical, even for the best franchises (except for the Patriots, it seems). The Dolphins will happily take a regrouping season like the Steelers are having now if it follows one of the best 15-year runs in recent memory.

He said it: “I think everybody you intend to draft, regardless of position, you’re hopeful for the best. It’s no different than any other position. It really is framed by what round you take them in. Obviously, if you take them in [rounds] 1 through 3, you expect them to be a starter. If that position happens to be quarterback, often times outside forces determine what a franchise quarterback is or is not. Just in general, frame of reference, anyone we draft in the first three rounds, it’s a reasonable expectation that they’re starting capable. ... We’re always drafting for competition, depth and future. We primarily build our team through the draft. We’re not heavy players in free agency by nature so that’s always our thoughtful intention.” — Steelers coach Mike Tomlin

This story was originally published October 23, 2019 at 2:37 PM.

Adam H. Beasley

Miami Herald

305-376-2387

Adam Beasley has covered the Dolphins for the Miami Herald since 2012, and has worked for the newspaper since 2006. He is a graduate of Syracuse University’s S.I. Newhouse School of Communications and has written about sports professionally since 1996. Support my work with a digital subscription