While the Steelers face many off-season changes, one thing that won’t change is their free safety. Minkah Fitzpatrick, going into his fifth season, is solidly entrenched there but what will change is how much he will be paid. Will be a lot or a ton?
Fitzpatrick is on the books for a little over $10 million on his fifth year option but the Steelers will want to lock him up long-term.
Maybe not quite TJ Watt money but it will be a multi-year deal that should run well into the tens of millions of dollars.
“You know it’s not really on my terms,” Fitzpatrick said in a year-end Zoom. “I would love to get it done just to guarantee the future and have it all done but like I said that’s up the people upstairs when they want to get it done. I know there’s some things they want to get done before they sign me, we got free agency coming up and all that so that’s up to them.”
Quote a few of his mates in the secondary can be free agents – Joe Haden, Ahkell Witherspoon and Terrell Edmunds – and Minkah spoke especially fondly of Haden – “one of my favorite players to play with” – and as you’d expect, he’d like to keep the gang together but he know how it works.
“My hope is to get everybody back,” he said. “I know we had our bumps in the road but I think we were a really good secondary this year. We were challenged a lot and held up for the most part and I think if we could bring back as many people back as we can that’s what we need to do.”
“Cohesion is extremely important in a secondary,” Fitzpatrick continued. “It’s not just about how fast you can run and how great you can play man-to-man. It’ about how well you can communicate, about being on the same page, everybody seeing things the same way. You have guys going all over the place in free agency so it’s not easy. Hopefully we can bring as many people back as we can.”
Linebacker Alex Highsmith, who had a solid second season, was saying the other day that he’d like to see the defense get more nasty.
Fitzpatrick doesn’t disagree but says first things first.
“I just think we need to get back to doing our jobs; doing the little things; executing, communicating, winning the one-on-ones,” he explained. “When you do that – are on your Ps and Qs, cross your T’s and dot your I’s – teams can’t move the ball on you, they can’t run, they can’t throw, they can’t escape the pocket, they can’t do numerous things that allow them to play freely.”
“I play every play with that aggressive, physical mentality but if I’m not in the right position it’s never going to show,” Minkah continued.
“If I’m not looking at the right things, it doesn’t matter what mentality I approach the game with because I’m never going to able to use (that physicality). I think there’s steps before we get to that mentality that need to get checked.”