A review of Omar Khan's first year as the Steelers GM

Khans moves for the Steelers this summer

I feel like Khan really shined this past summer and has come into his own. He remained busy after the draft, and his focus on constant depth was apparent. He shored up the quarterback room in short order, extending Mitch Trubisky and resigning Mason Rudolph. This gives the team one of the deeper quarterback rooms in the league.

The depth kept on coming. Markus Golden, Nick Kwiatoski, and Kwon Alexander all were added on minimum contracts and helped fill out their rooms. At this point in the offseason, these were bigger names, and while Kwiatoski didn’t make the team, this was all to give the defense options ahead of the season.

The focus on early extensions remained as well. While Alex Highsmith seemingly wasn’t holding in as other top names had done before, the Steelers still rewarded him with a new deal before training camp. This gave a deserving player his new deal and didn’t detract from practices during camp.

With the summer winding down, Khan made some more savvy trades, flipping Kevin Dotson for a pair of draft pick swaps and Kendrick Green for a future sixth-round pick. The Green trade was a shock, as I didn’t expect him to have any value considering his poor play and lack of chances to make this team. A future sixth is incredible.

As for Dotson, the writing was also on the wall. While a starter the past two seasons, he had firmly been replaced this season. He had little desire to stay here, so the advantage was on any team that tried to trade for him. They had the leverage, as the Steelers clearly didn’t. They got fair value for a player that they weren’t going to keep.

Add in the Desmond King addition after cuts and you had a strong summer showing from Khan. He improved this depth chart regularly, traded away players who weren’t going to have a role, and added some talent late in the process for cheap.