{"id":75556,"date":"2026-01-01T13:40:11","date_gmt":"2026-01-01T13:40:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/75556\/"},"modified":"2026-01-01T13:40:11","modified_gmt":"2026-01-01T13:40:11","slug":"steelers-legend-james-harrison-hammers-pittsburgh-nfl-draft-struggles","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/75556\/","title":{"rendered":"Steelers legend James Harrison hammers Pittsburgh NFL draft struggles"},"content":{"rendered":"

Dec. 31, 2025, 6:08 a.m. ET<\/p>\n

One of the most outspoken former Pittsburgh Steelers<\/a> out there is James Harrison. Harrison is a Steelers legend and has earned the right to be critical of his former team. After Sunday’s embarrassing loss to the Cleveland Browns<\/a>, Harrison railed about his former team and head coach Mike Tomlin and the struggles in the NFL draft since their last playoff win.<\/p>\n

Harrison noted on his Deebo and Joe Podcast<\/a> he does with former Steelers and Browns cornerback, Joe Haden, and Harrison was highly critical of Tomlin and the Steelers first and second-round draft picks after the 2016 season.<\/p>\n

\u201cSince our last playoff win in 2016 we cannot even pick right on the 1st and 2nd rounders,” Harrison said. “We\u2019ve made more misses than hits on our 1st and 2nd rounders. There\u2019s only two players on our squad that got extended in that timeframe to a long term deal that\u2019s TJ and Freiermuth and that\u2019s all on Coach T.\u201d<\/p>\n

For reference, here are the Steelers first and second-round picks from 2017 to 2025.<\/p>\n

2017<\/p>\n

First round – EDGE T.J. Watt<\/p>\n

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Second round – WR JuJu Smith-Schuster<\/p>\n

2018<\/p>\n

First round – S Terrell Edmunds<\/p>\n

Second round – WR James Washington<\/p>\n

2019<\/p>\n

First round – LB Devin Bush<\/p>\n

Second round – No pick<\/p>\n

2020<\/p>\n

First round – No pick<\/p>\n

Second round – WR Chase Claypool<\/p>\n

2021<\/p>\n

First round – RB Najee Harris<\/p>\n

Second round – TE Pat Freiermuth<\/p>\n

2022<\/p>\n

First round – QB Kenny Pickett<\/p>\n

Second round – WR George Pickens<\/p>\n

2023<\/p>\n

First round – OT Broderick Jones<\/p>\n

Second round – CB Joey Porter Jr.<\/p>\n

Second round – DT Keeanu Benton<\/p>\n

2024<\/p>\n

First round – OT Troy Fautanu<\/p>\n

Second round – C Zach Frazier<\/p>\n

2025<\/p>\n

First round – DT Derrick Harmon<\/p>\n

Second round – No pick<\/p>\n

We have often said that those final drafts of former General Manager Kevin Colbert were miserable and it really felt like he lost his touch. The jury is still out on the most recent drafts but it does feel like GM Omar Khan and Assistant GM Andy Weidl are doing a better job of talent evaluation.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Dec. 31, 2025, 6:08 a.m. ET One of the most outspoken former Pittsburgh Steelers out there is James…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":75557,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[942,73,75,74,29044,38167,543,15348,38877,25611,38875,38876,8759,2180,2173,2533,648,952,38874,8757,544,535],"class_list":["post-75556","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-pittsburgh","tag-accessfree","tag-pittsburgh","tag-pittsburgh-headlines","tag-pittsburgh-news","tag-sstssportsnflsteelers","tag-sstsnsteelers","tag-tagamerican-football","tag-tagcleveland-browns","tag-taggeorge-pickens","tag-tagjoey-porter-jr","tag-tagjuju-smith-schuster","tag-tagkeeanu-benton","tag-tagmike-tomlin","tag-tagnational-sports","tag-tagnfl","tag-tagnfl-hub","tag-tagoverall-negative","tag-tagoverall-neutral","tag-tagpat-freiermuth","tag-tagpittsburgh-steelers","tag-tagsports-news","tag-typestory"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75556","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=75556"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75556\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/75557"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=75556"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=75556"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=75556"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}