One of the debates as the Pittsburgh Steelers offseason approached centered on what to do with linebacker Jason Worilds. The Steelers opted to not sign Worilds to an extension and instead applied the transition tag to Worilds, keeping him on the roster for a single season.

It wasn’t an easy decision for the Steelers to place the transition tag on Worilds. Worilds go 11 starts in 2013, and racked up 8.0 sacks during that time.


Hardly a spectacular season, however when you implement a 3-4 base defense, pass-rushing outside linebackers are a hard enough to come by that teams will overpay.

And in a sense, the $9.754 million Worilds got in 2014 would certainly qualify. Worilds took a step back, only 7.5 sacks in a full 16 starts. Everyone expected to see Worilds break out and finally get double-digit sacks in his fifth season.

Unfortunately, since Worilds continued to under perform, the Pittsburgh front office finds them in essentially the same position they were at, only one year later. The Steelers really have three options.

First, they could let Worilds go out and test the waters in free agency.  But understand this. If the Steelers let Worilds dip his toe in the pool, he’ll never be back. Which isn’t the end of the world by any means. However, it is important to understand that if Worilds starts making team visits, he has certainly played his last game for the Steelers.

Second, the Steelers could try and sign Worilds to an extension.

Obviously, any extension for Worilds has to be fiscally responsible. The last thing this team needs to do is get wrapped up in a big contract on an average football player. Ideally, when these conversations come up, the notion of the “hometown discount” always comes into play, but the reality is NFL players have almost no loyalty and will chase the money in nearly every instance.

Finally, the Steelers do have the option to put the franchise tag on Worilds. That would lock him in for one more year, and give him one last shot to earn his spot. If the Steelers did put the franchise tag on Worilds, he would get a nice rise. The franchise tag for outside linebacker is 2015 is set to be right at $13 million. 

What’s the best course of action? It has to be to let Worilds leave. This team is making some real moves to free up cap space, extend quarterback Ben Roethlisberger and put themselves in a position to be competitive in the AFC for many years. There’s no reason to hang an anchor around their collective necks in the form of an huge extension for a player like Worlds.

And forget about that franchise tag. If I’m going to pay a linebacker $13 million, he’d better be named Justin Houston. I’m against the franchise tag on principle alone, but especially for Worilds in this case.

Another potential repercussion of Worilds hitting free agency is that the Steelers front office could be forced to bring veteran linebacker James Harrison back into the mix.  This wouldn’t be the worst thing that could happen as Harrison is nearly as talented as Worilds even at his age, and would cost only a fraction of the contract.

One thing you can be sure of is some team is going to pay Worilds too much for his services in 2015. Worlds have never lived up to expectations, but in the NFL, some owners are not afraid to keep throwing money at players like him. I’ll just be happy that it isn’t the Steelers.