Steelers 2-a-days: CB Ahkello Witherspoon, DT Chris Wormley assumed starting roles late in ‘21

Editor’s note: From now until the first practice of training camp at Saint Vincent College, the Trib will be running through the Pittsburgh Steelers’ 90-man roster, assessing each player’s outlook for the 2022 season. The breakdown will go through the roster in mostly-alphabetical order, two per day, between June 11 and July 25. Contract data courtesy spotrac.com.

CB AHKELLO WITHERSPOON

Experience: 6^th season

Contract status: $2.517 million cap hit in 2022, signed through 2021

2022 outlook: Few had a more eventful 2021 season than Witherspoon. He began the last calendar year playing the final of his 47 career games as a member of the San Francisco 49ers — ironically, it was a game against the Seattle Seahawks, with whom he would sign as a free agent two months later.

Witherspoon would never appear in a regular-season game for the Seahawks, though — he was traded to the Steelers less than two weeks before the regular season began. Then for the Steelers, he played just four snaps over the first half of the season — and during one of those snaps (all four came in Week 2), the Las Vegas Raiders’ Henry Ruggs had a long touchdown.

Witherspoon wasn’t activated for a game again until Nov. 21 (and purportedly only because of injury) — but once he got onto the field, he excelled. And by the end of the season, Witherspoon had acquitted himself as perhaps the Steelers’ best cornerback. He had three interceptions over the final five regular-season games.

That turned Witherspoon into a player the Steelers wanted to keep. But it seems as if he wanted to test the market, and in lieu of waiting (or perhaps because they truly decided they wanted to add two cornerbacks) the Steelers signed former Buffalo Bills cornerback Levi Wallace to a two-year contract soon after free agency opened. It wasn’t for another 10 days until Witherspoon’s signing was announced — under terms of the exact same contract Wallace was given.

Barring injury or something completely unforeseen, the Steelers will begin 2022 with a threesome of Witherspoon, Wallace and Cameron Sutton as their top three cornerbacks.

“Man, I had my daughter… Oct. 14,” Ahkello Witherspoon said recently. “So, you can imagine how my last few months have been, I have zero complaints." #Steelers #SteelersNation https://t.co/SLWFJr7ARw

— Tribune-ReviewSports (@TribSports) January 17, 2022

OLB CHRIS WORMLEY

Experience: 6^th season

Contract status: $2.9 million cap hit in 2022, after which scheduled for unrestricted free agency

2022 outlook: Wormley became a full-time starter for the first time in his career in 2021, the first year of a two-year, $4.5 million contract the Steelers gave him about a year after acquiring him in a 2020 trade from the rival Baltimore Ravens. It was rare intra-rivalry deal, and early in the 2020 season, it seemed to show why the Ravens were willing to make it. Wormley didn’t seem to be a good fit, and a back injury contributed to him playing only 51 defensive snaps until Thanksgiving.

But Wormley became a significant part of the defense late that season, and that led to the new contract — and when opportunity struck early in 2021 by way of season-ending injuries to Tyson Alualu and Stephon Tuitt, Wormley was ready to step up. He performed admirably enough — at least within the context of a defense that was awful against the run. Wormley did, however, have seven sacks in 2021, and he showed he can be a good No. 3 or No. 4 defensive lineman.

With Alualu back (albeit at age 35), Cameron Heyward coming off an All-Pro season and Larry Ogunjobi recently signed, Wormley is in the range of being the Steelers’ No. 4, competing for snaps with Montravius Adams, Isaiahh Loudermilk, rookie DeMarvin Leal and even Alualu (should Alualu slip). The Steelers could do a lot worse than Wormley for a top backup and fill-in starter.

Hey, Steelers Nation, get the latest news about the Pittsburgh Steelers here.