Despite being one of the highest-paid players on the Pittsburgh Steelers’ defense, FS Minkah Fitzpatrick hasn’t made as much of an impact in the splash game as he did in his first few seasons in the Steel City. Fitzpatrick had just one interception over the past two seasons, leading to fans’ anger being directed at him.
Fitzpatrick has a cap hit of $22.355 million this season, so some fans are arguing he should be cut or traded. steelers beat writer Ray Fittipaldo joins oneBurgh’s TroupCast on YouTube channel. He discussed what the Steelers will do with Fitzpatrick and gave his thoughts on Fitzpatrick’s contract.
“The way the Steelers operate, they’re not going to cut you until it makes sense financially to cut him,” Fittipaldo said. “And, like I said, you’ve got a dead cap. Even if you spread it out over one or two years, you’re still going to burn $15 million in dead cap money, but the Steelers won’t I don’t like Minka. I think it’s a bad contract…and it worked for a year or two, but then it just didn’t work out at all. So everyone makes mistakes, but I don’t. I think they will continue to protect Minka.”
Fitzpatrick signed an extension before the 2022 season, and it immediately seemed like a great deal. That year, he completed an NFL-leading six passes and allowed a passer rating of just 81.4 on completion.
Fitzpatrick’s splash play ability has taken a hit since the 2022 season. For the amount of money he’s being paid, more splash plays are expected, and he didn’t deliver. However, despite the lack of splash plays in 2023, Fitzpatrick had a pretty good season surrounded by journeymen in the secondary. He had a passer rating of 80.6 and a completion percentage of 56.3 percent. By Pro Football Reference. This completion percentage was Fitzpatrick’s highest since 2020.
Last year was clearly a down year for Fitzpatrick. He had one interception, had a passer rating of 127.6 on target, and a 78.8 percent complication rate, both career highs. Fitzpatrick admitted he didn’t play well last year, but it’s too early to judge him.
Fittipaldo notes that the contract may not be good for a player who doesn’t produce many splash plays, but since Fitzpatrick signed the extension, he’s become a top-five safety in the NFL. There is. Fitzpatrick played objectively better in 2022 and 2023, even if he didn’t force a turnover in 2023. While important points are important, they should not define how well a player played.
Firing Minkah Fitzpatrick doesn’t guarantee that his replacement will be able to play as well as he did. Sure, S. DeShon Elliott played great last year and is on a cheap contract. But that doesn’t mean any safety device can do it. For example, in S. Damonte Kazee’s first season in Pittsburgh (2022), he played really well. Since then, far more bad than good has happened for Kazee.
Before calling Minkah Fitzpatrick’s contract bad, we need to see how it plays out. If Fitzpatrick came back next year and intercepted a few passes, everyone would praise him and the contract would be good again, because he would have had three good seasons in the four years after the contract. .
