Steelers general manager Omar Khan and the team know they have to address the center position in the upcoming 2024 offseason. Whether that be through free agency, a trade, or the NFL Draft, the team has lots of options to explore to fill those voids. In an interview with our partners at WPXI, Khan expressed a desire to land the next great Steelers center.
“You know at the center position, there’s a high standard here,” Khan said. “I got spoiled. Man, I was around Maurkice Pouncey and Jeff Hartings during my time here. Obviously, there’s Dermotti Dawson. There were plenty of great centers here. There’s a high standard, so we owe it to ourselves to look at everything to find the next great Steelers center.”
In an earlier question, Khan noted that there were already some discussions on the trade front regarding the position and that the team believes it has solid targets in both free agency and the NFL Draft.
“All options are on the table,” Khan said. “There are some good free agents, but the window to talk to those guys isn’t open until next week. But there are some good free agents. There’s been some conversations about trades. And the draft, there’s some good centers in the draft.”
The Steelers’ options are appealing across the board. Guys like Lloyd Cushenberry, Andre James, Connor Williams, and Aaron Brewer make sense if they go for free agency. Meanwhile, in the NFL Draft, Jackson Powers-Johnson and Zach Frazier are certainly guys to watch. They have not hidden their affinity for both of those players. The team is showing their hand already with a potential free agency addition as Mitch Morse is set to visit the team.
The team will host Frazier for a local visit at some point before the NFL Draft, according to Ryan Fowler of the Draft Network. Frazier and Powers-Johnson are expected to be drafted within the first two rounds, and that expectation gained even more steam based on his measurements and workout at the NFL Combine. Despite not even testing, he helped himself out.