Mike Tomlin and his coordinators have taken the brunt of the blame for the disastrous end of the Steelers season. With good reason, they all were pretty culpable for the failures of the team this year. Everyone seems to be giving Omar Khan a pass despite his role in building this very flawed roster. He put together a team devoid of talent at the skill positions, left the team thin at corner, and spent even more money in free agency on an already expensive defense. How he’s managed to avoid criticism is a complete mystery.
Let’s start with the most glaring weakness on the team in 2024. The utter lack of talent at the wide receiver position was a huge factor in the struggles on offense. It seems clear now Khan’s months long quest to acquire Brandon Aiyuk was a failure on many levels. Not only was he unsuccessful in making the deal, it also distracted Khan from acquiring other potential trades or free agents. What Khan left the team with was a few castoffs like Van Jefferson, and Scotty Miller. This turned to desperation around the trade deadline. Unable to land significant names like Davante Adams or Christian Kirk, the Steelers were forced to settle for Mike Williams. Williams ended up with 13 catches for 132 yards in 9 games. Steelers wide receiver room: The worst in the Mike Tomlin era
Next, we have to take a very hard look at the quarterback position. It looked for a while like Khan had pulled off a brilliant move acquiring Russell Wilson. Once he took over as a starter in week seven, the offense took off. As time passed however, we got a good understanding into why the Broncos paid millions to get him off their roster. Wilson is a shell of his former self, and in no way an answer for a team looking to make a playoff run. His limitations got more and more glaring as the season went on. We now know the 2024 draft class at quarterback was historically good. Settling for a retread instead of attempting to move up in the draft is a huge gaffe.
Speaking of the draft, most of Omar Khan’s praise has come from what appeared on the surface to be two great draft classes since he took over. The more time goes by however, the more holes you can poke into that theory. After drafting tackles in the first round for two straight hearts, the Steelers are no closer to fixing that position as the day he took over. Broderick Jones is dangerously close to becoming an all time bust on par with the likes of Artie Burns and Jarvis Jones.
Troy Fautanu was projected to be a top ten pick in the draft by most. His injury red flags caused him to fall in the draft. Ignoring this fact, Khan was lauded as a genius for getting such a talent at 20th overall. To no one’s surprise in the scouting community, Fautanu got injured and missed the entire 2024 season. In fact, four of the seven draft picks missed the entire season on IR. Yet again everyone seems to be giving Omar Khan a pass on this draft.
Free agency wasn’t an area Omar Khan could hang his hat on either. We’ve already gone over his signings at wide receiver. Omar Khan decided to make his biggest free agent splash on defense. He signed Patrick Queen to a record contract this off-season. Putting aside Queen’s up and down performance on the field, spending more money on the already most expensive defense in the league seems a bit excessive. It looks even worse after watching that defense fall apart in the playoffs once again. We will give him credit for the DeShon Elliot signing. That may be his best move as general manager of this team.
To blame everything that has gone wrong with the Pittsburgh Steelers on Omar Khan would be a mistake. Giving him a complete pass like he has been getting is also a mistake. Omar Khan is the man in charge of the Pittsburgh Steelers football operations. One can argue that it’s really Mike Tomlin on charge, but thats up for debate. Theres a lot of blame to go around for the failures of the 2024 season. Omar Khan should be right there at the top of the blame pie.