Steelers 2-a-days: Chris Boswell coming off down season, Ja’Marcus Bradley an option at WR

Editor’s note: From the end of minicamp through the day the team reports to 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 2023 season. The breakdown will go through the roster in mostly-alphabetical order, (at least) two per day, between June 16 and July 26. Contract data courtesy spotrac.com.

K CHRIS BOSWELL

Experience: 9^th season

Contract status: $5.15 million cap hit in 2023, signed through 2026

2023 outlook: Looking at the totality of his career, Chris Boswell can be in the discussion as best kicker in Steelers history. Taking only his 2015-17 and 2019-2021 seasons, he might most definitely be.

But Boswell’s 2018, to be frank, was poor. And his 2022 wasn’t all that much better. And with 2022 being Boswell’s most recent season, that has to leave the Steelers with at least some level of concern headed into 2023.

Boswell missed eight field goals last season — a career-most. For context, Boswell missed only seven field goals from 2019-21 combined. And that was in 46 games. Boswell’s eight misses last season came in 12 games. Boswell’s 71.4% field-goal success rate in 2022 was the second-worst of his career to only 2018, when he missed seven of 20 attempts.

When that happened, Boswell was in the first year of a hefty contract extension. The same applied in 2022. Is that a coincidence? Probably. But it creates no less of a problem for the Steelers that their kicker didn’t perform like the one who (briefly as it was) was given the biggest contract for a player at his position in NFL history (four years, $20 million).

The Steelers brought in former Clemson kicker B.T. Potter to compete during camp. But how Potter performs is irrelevant if Boswell is looking like his old self. Barring a total collapse (or injury, of course), Boswell almost certainly will open the season as the Steelers’ kicker. But if at age 32 he has another down season (or another injury-riddled one), his contract is structured such that there it is not a lock Boswell will be the Steelers’ kicker in 2024.

DW4 tossing it up to Ja'Marcus Bradley pic.twitter.com/Yc8q9v4heh

— Cleveland Browns (@Browns) May 11, 2022

WR JA’MARCUS BRADLEY

Experience: 8 NFL regular-season games in 2020-21

Contract status: $940,000 cap hit in 2023 if he makes the team

2023 outlook: Antonio Brown has been gone for 4 ½ years, but No. 84 in a Steelers jersey — particularly when a wide receiver is wearing it — still pops. But that’s not the only reason those on hand at Steelers’ organized team activities or minicamp might have noticed Bradley. It was because he can make people notice him based on the plays he can make in practice-like settings.

Bradley (6-0, 198) was a star at the University of Louisiana. A former high school quarterback, Bradley was property of the Cleveland Browns from his signing as an undrafted free agent in 2020 until August of last year. The Steelers signed him to their practice squad in November and re-upped with him on a reserve/future contract in January.

Bradley is part of a logjam among 13 wide receivers on the camp roster, of which only six (at most) will make the 53-man roster. Of those and barring injury, Diontae Johnson, George Pickens, Allen Robinson and Calvin Austin are assured spots. Others offer some level of high special-teams aptitude/ability. Bradley will need to shine to ascend that list, but a practice-squad spot is always a possibility.

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