Devin Bush feels misunderstood.
He saw the reactions to his one and only interview that he did at the team's training camp at Saint Vincent College just one week ago. Bush knows what was in his heart and on his mind.
"I wasn’t trying to be disrespectful," Bush told me Wednesday. "I was just trying to be honest with it. I don’t know. I know I’m going to get a shot. We’ll see at the end of this year."
To be clear, the anger from Steelers fans directed at Bush came from his answer while surrounded by reporters at Saint Vincent College if he felt 2022 was a "make-or-break year for him."
"With the Steelers?" he replied.
When the answer was affirmative, Bush said, "It's a business. I'll still be in the NFL, so we'll see."
For Bush, it was an awkward moment and a snippet taken out of a lengthy interview. But, the 2018 first-round draft pick also understands the questions. After all, the Steelers declined to pick up the option for his fifth season of his rookie contract, meaning he's heading into the unknown.
But, as the 10th-overall pick in the 2019 NFL Draft, he also knows that even if things don't work out for him in Pittsburgh this season, some other team will likely give him a chance to show he can reclaim a career that was derailed to a certain degree by a torn ACL suffered five games into the 2020 season.
"Let’s just be honest about it. Whatever happens here, I’m going to be in the league," Bush told me. "That was my point. Say I don’t come back to the Steelers. If somebody picks me up on the vet minimum, I’ll still be in the NFL. I mean, I’m 24 years old. There are other first-round picks, and they get a chance. You know what I’m saying? I’m not going to say nobody is going to pick me up. Somebody would at least say, ‘Come to our camp.’ At least I’m going to get that shot. That’s what I meant when I said I’m still going to be in the NFL. I’m not saying, ‘Oh, I’ll be in the NFL no matter what.’ That’s not what I’m saying.
"It’s almost wild that when they cut the clip down, I have to explain it like that. What I was saying was, I don’t know what they think upstairs. I don’t know how they’ll adjust their numbers or what their next plan is. I’ve got to be honest with myself. I’m not going to sit here and break my own heart. Yeah, I love to be here. I’d love to stay here. I want to stay here. I’ve been working extremely hard to be here. But I don’t make those decisions."
In the offseason, the Steelers declined to pick up his fifth-year option, which would have guaranteed him $10.9 million.
Bush has said all along he understands that aspect of things. As a player who missed almost an entire season because of injury, it's tough to lock him in at nearly $11 million for 2023.
But the talk in some circles that he doesn't care about his profession? That bothers him.
"Put it this way, out of everybody that tore their ACLs in 2020, who was the only one that played the next season? Me," he told me. "Odell (Beckham), (Saquon) Barkley, Tarik Cohen, (Nick) Bosa, Bosa played. You look at Chase (Young) from Washington. They already ruled him out for the first few games. I came back the first game and played 85 percent of the snaps and had 10 tackles."
Bush did have 10 tackles and a forced fumble in his first game back in 2021, an upset win by the Steelers in Buffalo in Week 1 of last season. But the remainder of the season is one he'd just as soon forget.
Coming off the torn ACL, Bush appeared in 14 games, recording 70 tackles, 2.0 sacks, 4 pass defenses, 1 forced fumble and 1 fumble recovery.
But he often looked tentative in his reactions as he worked his way through his return.
He has repeatedly proclaimed himself 100 percent healed when he has spoken this offseason. But the Steelers also covered themselves by bringing in another athletic, young linebacker in Myles Jack after he was released by the Jaguars.
The ideal plan for the team would be to have two athletic, do-it-all linebackers. But Bush has been sharing time in the lineup with Robert Spillane. He was credited with no tackles in the team's Week 1 preseason game against the Seahawks, but responded with four tackles last weekend against the Jaguars.
"I think we are all learning as a group. We’ve got TA (Teryl Austin) now, a new DC, new coaches. We’re just trying get them all together," Bush said. "Individually, I think I did solid from an assignment standpoint. Would I have liked to have made more plays? Yeah. But assignment-wise, I think I did a really good job."
That's been what the coaching staff has said about him, as well.
But the biggest thing that has been missing throughout this process and for all of last year were the splash plays Bush made as a rookie. He didn't always know what he was doing on the field in 2019, but he had 109 tackles, 2 interceptions, 2 sacks, 4 fumble recoveries and a forced fumble.
"I was playing my second year and was not making splash like that, but I was playing solid," Bush said of his second season prior to his injury. "I wasn’t making splash. I made my first sack against the Cleveland Browns and got hurt the same game. So, it was there, but stuff happened."
Stuff happened.
The Steelers would like more of those splash plays out of Bush. They would like him to justify the team moving up from to the 10th pick in the 2019 draft from 20 to select him. So would Bush.
He'd also love to be part of the Steelers' long-term plans.
"100 percent. I’d love to be here," he told me. "But I can’t say that I’d love to be here so much that it would wreck my world if next year they said, ‘Nah, you’ve got to go.’ I’m not going to set myself up for disappointment. I’m going to keep my mind open. I’m going to go as hard as I can here, make plays and be a player here and see where it goes after the season. What if they sign me during the season? What if they sign me after the season? You never know. What if they trade me?"
The bottom line is that he just doesn't know. Bush's future beyond the 2022 season probably isn't with the Steelers. If he has a bounce back season, he might price himself off the team. If he has a poor season, they probably wouldn't want him back.
But you never say never. After all, the Steelers declined to pick up the fifth-year option on 2018 first-round draft pick Terrell Edmunds, then resigned the safety to a one-year deal worth $2.537 million.
It's not massive money, but Edmunds was inserted back into the starting lineup following his re-signing.
Could something similar happen with Bush? Perhaps. We'll see. And that's just what he doesn't know.
"I’m not trying to be an (jerk) or anything like that. I’m just trying to be honest," Bush said. "The Pittsburgh Steelers are going to be the Pittsburgh Steelers now or 20 years down the line. It is what it is."
But make no mistake, Bush does feel like he has a long, significant career ahead of him.
"It’s just all going to be behind me at the end of my career. It will be a story to tell," he said. "But I don’t mean to come off as a dude that don’t care. I come to work every day. I’m in the sun sweating. We were in the middle of nowhere at camp. If I didn’t care, I’d have been retired. You can’t play this game and not care. I care."
• So, Bush cares, but can he still play?
It seems like that is the case. But the fact is, he might never be the worthy of being selected with the 10th pick in the draft. He wouldn't be the first guy that a team has taken a swing at, and he certainly won't be the last.
But also know that young linebackers take time to develop. And Bush is still just 24 -- and he missed nearly an entire season.
He's right. He still does have time to regain his career.
And he's also right that even if things don't work out for him in Pittsburgh after this year, he'll be in the NFL somewhere.
Whether that's as a starter or as a camp invitee playing for the veteran minimum is up to him.
• That said, I still think it behooves the Steelers to explore their options in getting their top three safeties on the field together, even if that's in the base 3-4 defense.
Edmunds, Minkah Fitzpatrick and Damontae Kazee all can play. And more than one team out there is using three safety packages or big nickel packages to take advantage of having three solid safeties.
• The key, of course, is Fitzpatrick. He played all over Alabama's defense, including slot corner and dime linebacker.
Now, one of the reasons Fitzpatrick forced his way out of Miami was because the Dolphins were moving him all over the defense. But a big part of what the Dolphins were asking him to do was play dime linebacker. In the NFL.
The Steelers won't do that with him. But it wouldn't be surprising to see him playing in the slot more often this season.
That's not a bad matchup against, say, Mark Andrews of the Ravens.
• Speaking of safeties, the Steelers claimed Elijah Riley off waivers from the Jets Wednesday, releasing Donovan Stiner.
Riley, who played collegiately at Army, appeared in seven games last season with the Jets, all seven of which were starts. He finished the season with 45 tackles, a sack, one pass defense and 3 tackles for a loss.
While Stiner was the player released to make room on the roster for Riley, it wouldn't be surprising if Riley is competing directly with veteran safety Miles Killebrew for a roster spot. Killebrew, a special teams ace, missed a large portion of training camp with an injury and has a cap hit of $1.5 million this season.
He's a good special teams player, but is he worth that much?
• After ignoring the backup safety spot for a number of years, the Steelers really seem to care about it now.
Again, this is a team that seems to have a plan to play as many safeties as possible.
• The Steelers could have kept quarterback Chris Oladokun instead of releasing him this week, but they would only have been delaying the inevitable.
Oladokun wasn't going to play for them this week against the Lions and given they are actually game planning to play this game, he also wasn't going to get any snaps in practice, either.
So, they decided to release him now and keep a player who actually could see some action in this game.
That doesn't mean they can't or won't bring Oladokun back for their practice squad when the time comes.
It's simple housekeeping.
• As for releasing Genard Avery, that is a little more interesting.
Avery was brought in to provide depth at outside linebacker. But he missed a large portion of the offseason program and then a large portion of training camp because of injuries.
Oh, and the Steelers actually like Hamilcar Rashed, another player they signed after his release by the Jets a couple of weeks ago.
But that doesn't mean they won't still be keeping an eye on the waiver wire next week for outside linebacker help when teams cut down to 53 players.
• Ben Roethlisberger was at the Steelers practice on Wednesday. It was ironic considering Roethlisberger never or at least rarely practiced on Wednesdays during the season on install day.
The Steelers were installing their game plan for the game Sunday against the Lions. So, Roethlisberger only did a little less than he usually did on Wednesdays.
"I promise you he was a casual spectator," said Tomlin, who was among those who chatted with Roethlisberger during the practice. "Good to see the big boy."
