Keenan Lewis hip injury may prevent return to Steelers

You might want to squash those pipe-dreams you may have had of former Steelers cornerback Keenan Lewis returning to the team this season.

As per a Tweet from Steelers insider Gerry Dulac of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette on Thursday, after working Lewis out earlier this week, the front-office apparently didn’t like what it saw with regards to his hip injury:

“Steelers did not like what they saw w Keenan Lewis hip. You might not want to start penciling him on the roster.”

Lewis began his NFL career with the Steelers, when they made him their third round pick out of Oregan St. in the 2009 NFL Draft. He struggled mightily over his first two seasons, as he only appeared in a total of 13 games and looked to be on the verge of becoming a bust.

However, Carnell Lake became the Steelers’ secondary coach in 2011, and Lewis seemed to respond under his tutelage. Lewis saw his most extensive action that season, appearing in all 16 games and coming up with a game-saving interception in the final seconds of a 13-9 victory over the Chiefs in Week 12.

AROUND COVER32

Bold Predictions: Five bold predictions for Preseason Week 3

Injuries: Updates on DeMarcus Ware, Dez Bryant, Vontae Davis

Power Rankings: Dak Prescott still leads rookie QB rankings

Hard Knocks: Rams football is a business

Lewis won a starting spot opposite Ike Taylor in 2012. And even though he didn’t intercept a pass that year, he recorded a remarkable 23-passed defensed while starting all 16 regular season games and was arguably the team’s most consistent defensive back.

As bad timing would have it, 2012 just happened to be a contract-year for Lewis, and the cap-strapped Steelers allowed him to reach the open market, where his hometown Saints quickly inked him to a five-year, $26 million dollar contract.

For a Steelers’ secondary that was already lean on talent and growing long in the tooth, this was a pretty big blow. After finishing first against the pass in Lewis’ final year in Pittsburgh, the Steelers finished ninth, 27th and 30th in 2013, 2014 and 2015, respectively.

Meanwhile, Lewis started a combined 32 games during his first two years in New Orleans, and while he wasn’t a Pro Bowl player, he was certainly in the second-tier of NFL cornerbacks (and would have surely been the best one on the Steelers roster).

Perhaps as a means to not repeat the same mistake of allowing a good, young corner to leave via free-agency, the Steelers inked Cortez Allen, a fourth round pick out of The Citadel in the 2011 NFL Draft, to virtually the same five year, $26 million deal Lewis got with the Saints. Only rub: they did this prior to the 2014 season, when Allen still had one year left on his rookie contract.

Had they waited just one more season…….

After showing promise over his first three seasons, Allen’s play post-contract was so bad, that by the end of 2014, he was riding the bench in-favor of journeymen named Antwon Blake and Brice McCain.

Last season, Allen only appeared in one game and was mercifully released in April.

As for Lewis’ 2015 campaign, it wasn’t much better than that of his former teammate.

After having hip surgery in September, Lewis only played in six games a season ago.

Lewis was said to have had a rather contentious relationship with Saints second-year defensive coordinator Dennis Allen, and that was used as a possible explanation for why New Orleans released him last weekend.

With that in-mind, it was certainly enticing to envision Lewis coming to Pittsburgh and starting alongside Ross Cockrell, while veteran corner William Gay slid over to the slot position (an ideal fit for him). But if Dulac’s report is to be believed, it’s best to erase those visions from your memory.

As of this writing, there are still a handful of teams interested in Lewis’ services–and the Steelers are officially one of them.

But if they’ve already determined that Lewis isn’t 100 percent healed from an injury he had surgery on a year ago, why would the Steelers take a chance on him?

The Steelers have enough injury problems–Ladarius Green, Senquez Golson–no need to add to that by signing Keenan Lewis.

The post Keenan Lewis hip injury may prevent return to Steelers appeared first on Cover32.