Apr 27, 2015 4 min read

PITTSBURGH – With just a couple of days remaining before the NFL draft begins Thursday, it would be hard to blame Steelers general manager Kevin Colbert or head coach Mike Tomlin if they feel a little like a kid on Christmas Eve.

Only they don’t have visions of sugar plums dancing in their heads. Instead, they dream of shutdown cornerbacks and pass-rushing linebackers.

Those are the Steelers’ biggest needs. As good fortune would have it, those are two well-stocked positions in this draft.

“I think it is,” said Colbert when asked if that was a pleasant coincidence. “Those groups, especially outside linebacker, it’s an unusual year. Some teams look at those guys as 4-3 ends. Of course, we look at them as linebackers. We’ve worked them out as such. It’s just better than it has been. I’m talking about some real impact players. That’s encouraging.”

The Steelers head into the seven-round draft, which concludes Saturday, with eight selections.

Expect them to select at least one cornerback and an outside linebacker to help offset offseason losses. At cornerback, Ike Taylor retired and Brice McCain signed with Miami. Linebacker Jason Worilds retired.

The Steelers have the 22nd selection in the first round and are a good bet to target one of those two positions with their top selection.

“I think the cornerback group is good,” Colbert said. “I think the outside linebacker types … this is probably as good a group at that position as I have seen in probably 10 to 15 years. It really is an exceptional group with a lot of impact-type guys.

Tomlin and Colbert met with approximately 130 players in preparation for this draft, either at the NFL Draft Combine, on-campus workouts or in 30 meetings they are permitted to have with players at the team’s offices.

They don’t often select players with whom they haven’t met.

“There’s probably been a handful since Coach and I have been together,” Colbert said. “We try to touch base with as many as we can. Very rarely have we drafted someone who we didn’t interview.”

Those interviews are especially important in helping assess a player’s mental approach to the game and his personality and eliminating those who might be considered character risks.

“I’m not afforded the opportunity to watch people play in person,” Tomlin said. “There is value in terms of sharing the same space with a person and getting to watch them in their setting at their university interacting among their peers. (We want) to hear what others, formally and informally, have to say about them.”

With the league more cognizant than ever regarding off-field conduct, teams spent more time assessing the risk versus the reward of selecting certain players.

“You try to find out what the exact circumstance was,” Colbert said. “Why a guy was suspended; why a guy tested positive; why a guy was thrown off a team.

“There’s a story behind everything that goes on, right, wrong or indifferent. It’s our job to get to the root of the matter and figure out whether we want to take the chance or not.”

The Steelers are aware some teams put out damaging information – true or false – in an attempt to taint a player’s reputation and possibly allow their stock to slip.

“I think it’s disrespectful to our profession,” Colbert said. “It’s disrespectful to the game. It’s disrespectful to the kid. I think it’s horrible. Knowing that, we really don’t pay attention to it. We’re going to be true to what we believe. We don’t believe in mock drafts and what people are saying about other teams because so much of it is misinformation. You just lose your mind trying to figure out what everyone’s going to do. We’ll just be true to what we do, feel good about it and live with it.”

Colbert said, as usual, the Steelers have been in contact with every team in the league regarding possible trading of draft picks or players. … Wide receiver Antonio Brown, who did not attend the opening week of optional workouts, was in attendance Monday, though Tomlin refused to comment about a report Brown was contemplating a holdout in an effort to have his contract reworked. … Tomlin said the three-game suspension for running back Le’Veon Bell has not affected the team’s draft board or made acquiring another running back a priority. The Steelers signed veteran DeAngelo Williams in the offseason to be Bell’s backup. … The only position Colbert would rule out in terms of taking a player early in the draft was quarterback.