openness to trading back in the 2026 NFL Draft<\/a> during one of his media sessions at the NFL owner meetings. But if you\u2019ve paid attention, he\u2019s said the same thing every year in some form or fashion. He\u2019s always open to all possibilities.<\/p>\nThis year makes more sense than ever for Pittsburgh, but not if the result is picking up more 2026 capital rather than more coveted picks next year.<\/p>\n
All it takes is one team to be in love with a prospect when the Steelers are on the clock to change this. But what\u2019s clear is the long-held idea that the Steelers can just flip a few picks to 2027 is not going to be easily achieved.<\/p>\n
If 2026 picks are the lesser asset, the Steelers wouldn\u2019t be flipping them for equal value. They\u2019d be paying a premium to get into 2027. How exactly teams have assigned that value remains to be seen, but could pick No. 21 in the first round be viewed as a 2027 second-rounder for trade purposes? Could it cost two current picks for the price of one next year? That\u2019s the calculus that must be considered if Omar Khan wants to trade back.<\/p>\n
There\u2019s a reason why the Steelers haven\u2019t executed a current-year draft pick trade for a future-year draft pick trade since 1999\u2014 a year before Kevin Colbert was even in charge. The Steelers hardly ever trade back, and certainly not for future draft value. It\u2019s the antithesis of everything they believe in as a win-now organization. I can\u2019t imagine them wanting to give up $1.25 in 2026 for 75 cents in 2027. That\u2019s bad business.<\/p>\n
The other option is packaging later-round 2026 picks with proven veterans\u2014lowering the risk for a trade partner and possibly loosening the grip on 2027 capital. (More on that in my Sunday column.)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Pittsburgh Steelers have 12 picks and no clear path to upgrading at quarterback this year, so the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":738278,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[2055],"tags":[4955,11148,12,7,7337,6,520,57,2360,426],"class_list":{"0":"post-851381","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-pittsburgh-steelers","8":"tag-2026-nfl-draft","9":"tag-2027-nfl-draft","10":"tag-espn","11":"tag-football","12":"tag-matt-miller","13":"tag-nfl","14":"tag-pittsburgh","15":"tag-pittsburgh-steelers","16":"tag-pittsburghsteelers","17":"tag-steelers"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/116341364876049812","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/851381","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=851381"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/851381\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/738278"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=851381"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=851381"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=851381"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}