{"id":206998,"date":"2025-07-14T18:14:12","date_gmt":"2025-07-14T18:14:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/206998\/"},"modified":"2025-07-14T18:14:12","modified_gmt":"2025-07-14T18:14:12","slug":"redrafting-the-steelers-picks-in-the-2022-nfl-draft","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/206998\/","title":{"rendered":"Redrafting the Steelers picks in the 2022 NFL draft"},"content":{"rendered":"

For all the good he did while he was the General Manager of the Pittsburgh Steelers<\/a>, Kevin Colbert’s 2022 NFL draft class<\/a> and its failings will always tarnish his legacy. Here is what the 2022 draft haul amounted to.<\/p>\n

First round – QB Kenny Pickett<\/p>\n

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Second round – WR George Pickens<\/p>\n

Third round – DT Demarvin Leal<\/p>\n

Fourth round – WR Calvin Austin III<\/p>\n

Sixth round – TE\/FB Connor Heyward<\/p>\n

Seventh round – LB Mark Robinson<\/p>\n

Seventh round – QB Chris Oladokun<\/p>\n

Heading into 2025, Pickett and Pickens are both long gone, and unless Austin has a breakout campaign, there won’t be a single impact player from this draft on the team. Pickett was a bust from the beginning and the risk\/reward of Pickens was enticing enough to take the chance but it didn’t work at all.<\/p>\n

Using a little hindsight and a little common sense, here’s how we wish the draft had played out.<\/p>\n

First round – C Tyler Linderbaum<\/p>\n

The Steelers needed a starting center after the retirement of Maurkice Pouncey and Linderbaum was an elite prospect.<\/p>\n

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Second round – WR Alec Pierce<\/p>\n

Pierce led the NFL with 22.3 yards per catch in 2024 and is set see a big bump in targets this season.<\/p>\n

Third round – DT Demarvin Leal<\/p>\n

We leave Leal here because the options at defensive tackle here.<\/p>\n

Fourth round – WR Khalil Shakir<\/p>\n

Shakir was far and away a better prospect coming out of college over Calvin Austi III.<\/p>\n

Sixth round – TE\/FB Connor Heyward<\/p>\n

For the sake of nepotism, we leave Heyward here as the pick depite his lack of production.<\/p>\n

Seventh round – RB Isaiah Pacheco<\/p>\n

We loved Pacheco coming out of college and he’s proven to be as good in the NFL as his film.<\/p>\n

Seventh round – QB Skylar Thompson<\/p>\n

Thompson is currently on the Steelers and while he’s not a starter, he’s just as worthy of this pick as any quarterback. We also didn’t take the easy way out and put Brock Purdy here despite having a fifth-round grade on him pre-draft.<\/p>\n

This article originally appeared on Steelers Wire: Redrafting the Steelers picks in the 2022 NFL draft<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"For all the good he did while he was the General Manager of the Pittsburgh Steelers, Kevin Colbert’s…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":25531,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[4994,2644,4086,7836,28205,10037,7,467,7399,570,9977,7468,21525,6,15,57,2681,3917,7427],"class_list":{"0":"post-206998","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nfl-draft","8":"tag-alec-pierce","9":"tag-brock-purdy","10":"tag-calvin-austin","11":"tag-chris-oladokun","12":"tag-connor-heyward","13":"tag-demarvin-leal","14":"tag-football","15":"tag-george-pickens","16":"tag-isaiah-pacheco","17":"tag-kenny-pickett","18":"tag-kevin-colbert","19":"tag-khalil-shakir","20":"tag-maurkice-pouncey","21":"tag-nfl","22":"tag-nfl-draft","23":"tag-pittsburgh-steelers","24":"tag-seventh-round","25":"tag-skylar-thompson","26":"tag-tyler-linderbaum"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/114852951751830676","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/206998","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=206998"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/206998\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/25531"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=206998"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=206998"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=206998"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}