Steelers Try Out Three Free Agent Defensive Backs

The Pittsburgh Steelers tried out three free agent defensive backs on Thursday, according to the NFL transactions page.

The team hosted defensive backs Carthell Flowers-Lloyd, Thomas Graham Jr. and Herb Miller at UPMC Rooney Sports Complex on Thursday.

The club is getting relatively healthy at defensive back to close the 2023 regular season, with safeties Minkah Fitzpatrick and Trenton Thompson returning to practice from injuries this week and Damontae Kazee set to get back from his suspension if the Steelers are able to advance into the playoffs.

So it’s likely the Steelers are looking at players to sign for reserve/future contracts for the 2024 season when that market opens next week.

Miller, 28, is the most experienced of the three. The 6-foot-1, 201-pound FAU alum first joined the Kansas City Chiefs as undrafted free agent in 2019. Since then, he has spent time with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, Cleveland Browns, Carolina Panthers and Buffalo Bills.

He was with Carolina all this offseason, but cut at the end of training camp. Miller spent most of this season on the Buffalo practice squad, but did not play in any games.

In his career, Miller has played in four games with Tampa in 2020, nine with Cleveland in 2021 and another four with the Browns last season. In total, he has played in 17 career games and recorded 11 tackles, one fumble recovery, one pass defended and one interception. He has played only 26 career snaps of defense, with the vast majority of his playing time coming on special teams.

Graham, 24, is in his third pro season out of Oregon. The 5-foot-11, 197-pound cornerback was a sixth-round draft pick of the Chicago Bears in 2021. He spent his first season in Chicago, playing in four games and making one start while recording 13 tackles, one for a loss and one pass defended.

Coming out of training camp in 2022, the Bears waived Graham and put him through to the practice squad, but the Cleveland Browns signed him away a week weeks later. Graham played in seven games with the Browns in 2022. A training camp injury ended his 2023 season and he was released on Nov. 28.

Graham played mostly outside cornerback with Chicago in 2021, but was used almost exclusively in the slot by Cleveland in 2022.

Flowers-Lloyd is a 6-foot-2, 205 pound defensive back who played in the CFL this summer. He played in 18 games with the Hamilton Tiger-Cats, and made 31 tackles, all on special teams.

A Syracuse, New York native, the 25-year-old Flowers-Lloyd started his college career at Eastern Michigan. He spent four years in Ypsilanti, played in 31 games for the Eagles before transferring to Stony Brook at the FCS level, where he spent the 2021 and 2022 seasons.

It wasn’t until he was with Stony Brook that Flowers-Lloyd became a starter, as he started 20 of 21 games over his two seasons with the Seawolves. He went undrafted in 2023 NFL Draft and caught on with Hamilton last summer.