{"id":159997,"date":"2026-03-11T03:28:42","date_gmt":"2026-03-11T03:28:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/159997\/"},"modified":"2026-03-11T03:28:42","modified_gmt":"2026-03-11T03:28:42","slug":"steelers-have-clear-deadline-for-patrick-queen-trade-talks","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/159997\/","title":{"rendered":"Steelers Have Clear Deadline for Patrick Queen Trade Talks"},"content":{"rendered":"

Steelers News<\/a><\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\"PittsburghPittsburgh Steelers linebacker Patrick Queen in a playoff game against the Houston Texans on Jan. 12, 2026. — Ed Thompson \/ Steelers Now\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

The Pittsburgh Steelers have been fielding trade calls<\/a> for inside linebacker Patrick Queen<\/a>, and while the Steelers have not outright rejected the idea of trading their green-dot inside linebacker, whose contract expires after the 2026 season, no trade has come together to this point, either.<\/p>\n

The Dallas Cowboys reportedly called about Queen, one of at least three teams that have called the Steelers about the former All-Pro linebacker, sources told Steelers Now.\u00a0<\/p>\n

For whatever reason \u2014 likely money \u2014 the deal between the Steelers and Cowboys hit a snag<\/a>. The Cowboys are hard against the salary cap, and Queen has a high cap hit in 2026. If any team is going to want him in a trade, they\u2019re going to need to negotiate a contract extension beyond this season that will reduce that initial cap hit, just like the Steelers did with wide receiver Michael Pittman.<\/p>\n

The Steelers probably also would like to sign Queen to an extension, or find some other way to reduce his cap hit in 2026, if he intends to play out the string with the team.<\/p>\n

Queen is set to count for $17.2 million against the Steelers\u2019 salary cap in 2026, but $13.33 million of that is new, non-guaranteed money \u2014 and there\u2019s the rub. Queen is owed a $2.5 million roster bonus on Friday, March 13.<\/p>\n

If Queen is traded before Friday, he would leave behind a very reasonable dead cap hit of $3.86 million. If the Steelers wait until after Friday, it balloons to $6.36 million.\u00a0<\/p>\n

So if the Steelers are going to find a trading partner for Queen, it almost certainly has to happen this week. The same goes for some kind of contract extension or renegotiation. The Steelers would certainly love to be able to turn that bonus and some of the rest of Queen\u2019s 2026 salary into a signing bonus that could be prorated over the course of a longer deal.<\/p>\n

But if Friday passes and he gets paid the $2.5 million, that money must stay on the Steelers\u2019 rolls for 2026.<\/p>\n

So if something is going to happen on the Queen front \u2014 be it a trade out of Pittsburgh or new contract to stay long-term \u2014 expect it to happen this week.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tMentioned In This Article: Patrick Queen<\/a> Pittsburgh Steelers<\/a> Steelers<\/a> <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Steelers News Pittsburgh Steelers linebacker Patrick Queen in a playoff game against the Houston Texans on Jan. 12,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":159998,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[9,24,63,126,127,122,124,123,622],"class_list":["post-159997","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-queens","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-nyc","tag-patrick-queen","tag-pittsburgh-steelers","tag-queens","tag-queens-headlines","tag-queens-news","tag-steelers"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/159997","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=159997"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/159997\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/159998"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=159997"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=159997"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=159997"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}