Joe Starkey says the Steelers should trade T.J. Watt and use the savings to make Nick Herbig the priority, a blunt answer that pushed Pittsburgh’s pass-rush conversation from theory into something much sharper. He said the club should have made that move long before now in the name of rebuilding.
The point landed because Starkey was not arguing that Watt is washed up. He said Watt still has “some great football in front of him,” even if his best years are behind him, and reminded readers that a team would still want him on a new deal. That is why the name is suddenly back in circulation: in a current mailbag discussion, Watt’s future and Herbig’s contract status were put on the same page.
Starkey backed up the case with production that would still draw real interest around the league. Even in what he called a down year, Watt finished with seven sacks, three forced fumbles, two fumble recoveries, one interception, eight defended passes, 10 tackles for loss, 27 quarterback pressures and 19 quarterback hits. “Let’s not act like he’s suddenly Taco Charlton,” Starkey wrote, making the larger point that a player with that kind of disruption would still have a market even if the contract was expensive.
That market, in Starkey’s view, is where the debate turns practical. He said teams that would chase Myles Garrett would also chase another high-impact edge rusher, and he said the Steelers should be listening if Philadelphia, Dallas, the Giants or the Buffalo Bills called. He added that Pittsburgh could get a first-round pick for Watt, though not the kind of return Cleveland drew for Garrett, which Starkey described as a first-round pick, a young player named Jared Verse and two other picks.
That is where the argument gets uncomfortable for Pittsburgh. Starkey can make room for Watt’s reputation and still conclude the team should move him, because he also believes the organization should have gone all in on getting younger several years ago. His answer was not a knock on Watt’s value. It was a judgment about timing, cap allocation and the roster cycle the Steelers are trying to manage.
Herbig is the other half of that view. Starkey called him a star in the making and said plainly, “Nick Herbig should be the priority here.” He went even further in one of his trade-off scenarios, saying that if Pittsburgh could get the contract off the books, pay Herbig and add another first-round pick, he was in favor of it.
Starkey also sketched how radical a youth-first reset might look if the Steelers ever took it that far. In an expansion draft scenario, he said Troy Fautanu, Nick Herbig, Alex Highsmith, Derrick Harmon, Zach Frazier, Max Iheanachor, Joey Porter Jr. and Chris Boswell would be his eight protected players, and he added that he loves having one of the top five kickers in NFL history. For now, though, there is no actual trade, no contract decision and no sign Pittsburgh is ready to move Watt. The question is whether the Steelers are willing to treat Herbig as the future before that future is forced on them.
