Has Terrell Edmunds earned a contract extension with the Steelers?

Terrell Edmunds wasn’t awarded the fifth-year option by the Steelers, but perhaps the plan is still to get him a contract extension. 

Many fans and analysts were surprised that the Steelers let the time tick down on giving Terrell Edmunds the fifth-year option. With the deadline passed, the former 2018 first-round pick is set to become a free agent at the end of the season. But perhaps Pittsburgh has no intentions of letting him go.

Recently, general manager Kevin Colbert was on 93.7 The Fan discussing some of the team’s recent moves. According to Andrew Phillipponi, Colbert insisted that this was strictly a salary cap issue and that Edmunds played his best football last season:

This is certainly understandable. The recent pandemic causes a drastic drop in NFL teams’ salary caps in 2021, and the base cap is down to $182.5 million, according to Over the Cap. With the way the Steelers have been structuring all of their contracts in an effort to win now, they apparently didn’t even have enough left over to keep Steven Nelson around this year.

However, being forced to be cap compliant doesn’t mean that the Steelers don’t like Terrell Edmunds enough to give him a multi-year extension, and perhaps this is something that could happen after the 2021 season. The question is, should Pittsburgh offer him a new deal?

Should the Steelers give Edmunds an extension?

This is a difficult question, as there is no cut-and-dry response. Obviously, forking up new deals for players like T.J. Watt and Minkah Fitzpatrick soon will be do-brainer decisions. At the same time, Pittsburgh didn’t even give former first-round picks Artie Burns or Jarvis Jones a second thought after their rookie contracts expired.

What do you do with a player that falls somewhere in the middle?

First, the Steelers must weigh the value of the strong safety position and consider how much they are going for on the market. This offseason, only three safeties signed extensions for upwards of $10 million in yearly value: Justin Simmons, Marcus Maye, and John Johnson. Even with another year of play under his belt this coming season, Edmunds probably won’t fetch that kind of money.

Now the question is: does Edmunds deserve a new deal. At the moment, I would so no – at least not for the money that he will likely sign for. Finding a replacement level strong safety isn’t very hard to do in today’s NFL. However, that doesn’t mean that Edmunds couldn’t prove to be worthy of an extension if he takes another step forward.

Last year was his best season, without a doubt. After allowing 72.0 percent of passes to be completed for a 131.6 passer rating and 4 touchdowns in coverage in 2019, the former first-round pick greatly improved those numbers in 2020, according to Pro Football Reference. Last year, Edmunds allowed just 55.6 percent of passes completed in his direction for a 70.8 passer rating while surrendering just one score.

At this point in time, I would be a little reluctant to give Edmunds a multi-year extension. While we know at this point that he will probably never be a star safety, he is still just 24 years old, and there is something to be said with continuity and in the secondary. With another good season, perhaps an extension makes sense.