A Retirement Home in Tennessee for Old Steelers

Good morning,

Ike Taylor believes a number of veteran Steelers could wind up with the Tennessee Titans this year because of Dick LeBeau.

It could be a nice assisted living home for Taylor and a few others as they try to squeeze one more year out of their NFL careers.

There is no secret that Taylor and probably Troy Polamalu, Brett Keisel and maybe even James Harrison will not return to play on the Steelers defense next season. If not and they still want to play, LeBeau might find a few or maybe even all of them useful as he and Ray Horton try to strengthen their 3-4 defense with the Titans.

“You don’t have to ask the veteran guys who have played under him,’’ Taylor told the Tennessean. “Just say Coach LeBeau wants you to come, and they’d say: ‘What time?’ That’s the way people feel about him.”

Maybe they could even lure Jason Worilds to Tennessee.

But what do the Titans have to offer, other than maybe a job, and what do these players have to offer the Titans, other than their names and what they’ve accomplished in the past?

The Steelers would not let them go if they thought they could help them and the Steelers defense was just about every bit as bad as the one in Tennessee last season.

The contracts of Taylor and Harrison will expire March 10 with the Steelers. Polamalu and Keisel are signed for this season but are expected to be released. Worilds will be free March 10 if the Steelers do not either re-sign him or hit him with the transition tag again, something they are also not expected to do.

But even the lure of LeBeau might not be enough for the veterans whom Taylor alluded.

“If the money is right in Tennessee, yeah, I could see it,’’ Taylor said. “The money doesn’t have to be spectacular, but if the money is right, I can tell you they are willing to go where Coach LeBeau is. … There is just a genuine, mutual respect that I have for that man, and other guys have it, too.

“I would come to Tennessee, but only because of Coach LeBeau.”

Worilds especially would not be expected to go to Tennessee merely because LeBeau is now in charge of the Titans’ defense. He is more likely to go somewhere that will offer him top dollar.

For one, Taylor said he doubts he will be back with the Steelers. He took a paycut from $7 million to $3.5 million last season to stay, then complained about it, then had another poor season in 2014.

“I doubt it,’’ he said. “For one, I think they think I am too old. For two, I’ve been there 12 years and they just paid a young guy in Cortez Allen. Even though Ike Taylor is the ultimate team guy, his name and his presence. … I am the alpha. So if you want to move on from Ike Taylor, Ike Taylor has to be out of the building.”

---

With two seasons down and two to go, the Steelers are right around where they should be in the minimum requirement of spending 89 percent of the salary cap in cash over the period of 2013-2017.

Under the most recent collective bargaining agreement passed in 2011, each NFL team must pay out in cash 89 percent of the total of all four cap years during that period. If any team falls below that figure, the amount they were short must be made up in distributions to players who were on their roster during those four seasons.

Cash is different than salary cap in that it is simply the amount of money the team pays out each year. For example, a five-year signing bonus given a player of $25 million this year counts for salary cap purposes only $5 million annually over five years on the cap books. However, in the cash accounting, all $25 million would be counted this year.

In figures from the NFL Players Association provided to the Post-Gazette last evening, the Steelers have paid out 88.28 percent of the salary cap combined in the first two years.

In 2013, they spent $104,413,817 in cash and in 2014 they spent $121,574,781 in cash. With the cap expected to rise from $133 million last year to $143 million this year, the Steelers would have to spend about $132 million in cash in 2015 in order to meet the average of 89 percent over the first three years.

Ben Roethlisberger’s impending contract extension along with its signing bonus should go a long way to help reach that goal.