JuJu Smith-Schuster

JuJu Smith-Schuster's recent Instagram activity may hint at his plans for free agency.

Kaitlin O'Toole of Sports Illustrated posted a poll on Instagram on Thursday, asking whether the star wide receiver would remain in Pittsburgh. Tasked with choosing between "that's a negative" and "I hope so," Smith-Schuster was among the first five to vote that he wouldn't be returning to the team.

The 24-year-old is "unlikely" to accept a new deal from the Steelers, according to Bob Labriola of Steelers.com, since the team is barely under the salary cap and it would be difficult to present him with an attractive offer. Pittsburgh has just $6.2 million in cap space, per Over The Cap, even after restructuring quarterback Ben Roethlisberger's contract last week.

Smith-Schuster, who was the team's second-round pick in 2017, totaled 831 yards and nine touchdowns on 97 receptions in 2020, two seasons after earning a Pro Bowl nod with 1,426 yards and seven scores.

It's looking increasingly like JuJu Smith-Schuster's career in Pittsburgh is over.

Bob Labriola of the team's official site wrote Smith-Schuster is "unlikely to want to accept" a contract from the Steelers because of the team's cap constraints. Pittsburgh is currently just $3.6 million under the projected cap for 2021.

Smith-Schuster will be part of a loaded wide receiver free-agent crop that also includes Chris Godwin, Allen Robinson II, Kenny Golladay and Will Fuller V. Godwin and Robinson may wind up receiving the franchise tag from their current teams, which would leave Golladay, Fuller and Smith-Schuster as the top names on the market.

While Smith-Schuster has largely failed in taking over the top spot in the Steelers' wideout depth chart, he's a wildly talented slot receiver who could benefit from returning to a WR2 spot. Smith-Schuster hauled in 97 passes for 831 yards and nine touchdowns last season, emerging as Ben Roethlisberger's favorite underneath target but struggling to make big plays.

Pro Football Focus gave Smith-Schuster an overall grade of 68.2 for the 2020 season. Despite skepticism about his status with the franchise, the USC product remains publicly open to returning. Smith-Schuster posted "let's talk" on Instagram last week following Ben Roethlisberger's contract restructuring and said last month that he would "love" to stay in Pittsburgh. 

"I do want to play for a team that competes for the Super Bowl every year," Smith-Schuster told the Yinzhers Podcast. "That's in the playoffs. Obviously, the Steelers are that. I do want to play for a great quarterback, not knowing what Ben's going to do. I do want to be paid a reasonable price for what I'm worth. 

"In all consideration, I would love to stay with the Steelers. I would love to stay with them, but as of right now, we're just kind of up in the air, waiting." 

As it stands, the likeliest scenario remains a team wanting Smith-Schuster enough to entice him away from the only NFL home he's known. 

Ben Roethlisberger will be back with the Pittsburgh Steelers for the 2021 NFL season, and he'll reportedly take a big pay cut to do so. 

The Steelers announced Thursday they signed a new contract with the six-time Pro Bowler. According to ESPN's Adam Schefter, Roethlisberger's cost against the salary cap will fall by more than $15 million. Ian Rapoport of NFL Network provided additional details:

The 39-year-old was originally due to carry a $41.2 million cap hit, which would've been the largest in the league. Pittsburgh was between a rock and a hard place because it didn't really have a backup plan but couldn't afford to absorb that kind of number with the salary cap itself due to fall compared to 2020.

And for as much as Roethlisberger helped the team, Spotrac still projects the Steelers to be nearly $7.3 million over a $185 million cap. That doesn't reflect his amended contract, either.

General manager Kevin Colbert still has to shed a lot of money with James Conner, JuJu Smith-Schuster, Alejandro Villanueva, JuJu Smith-Schuster and Bud Dupree among the team's notable free agents. Then you have to factor in draft picks and outside reinforcements to capitalize on a window to contend that remains open for as long as Roethlisberger is on the roster.

In a normal season, established veterans can find themselves out of a job because a team needs to create financial flexibility. ESPN's Dianna Russini spoke to an NFL head coach who said to expect a "massacre" in reference to upcoming roster cuts across the NFL.

With Roethlisberger's future sorted, the hard part still lies ahead for Colbert.

WBC interim lightweight champion boxer Ryan Garcia's Body Shot Challenge consists of him punching varied athletes, celebrities and people in the midsection (most with padding) repeatedly until they can no longer take the punishment.

Pittsburgh Steelers wide receiver JuJu Smith-Schuster took his turn on Wednesday and managed to field 21 shots before falling to the ground in an impressive showing.

Garcia is a rising boxing star. The 22-year-old has won all 21 of his professional fights, 18 by way of knockout (including his last five). BoxRec ranks him as the No. 64 pound-for-pound fighter in the world and sixth among lightweights.

Smith-Schuster has played all four of his NFL seasons with the Steelers. The one-time Pro Bowler has caught 308 passes for 3,726 yards and 26 receiving touchdowns in 58 games.

He will become a free agent on March 17 when the new league year officially begins.

The Pittsburgh Steelers are reportedly expected to allow running back James Conner and wide receiver JuJu Smith-Schuster to leave in free agency during the 2021 NFL offseason.  

ESPN's Brooke Pryor reported Tuesday the Steelers have limited financial flexibility and their "priority" is retaining cornerbacks Mike Hilton and Cameron Sutton, which likely won't leave enough cap space to bring back either Conner or Smith-Schuster.

Pittsburgh features three other receivers who made a significant impact in 2020—Diontae Johnson (923 yards), Chase Claypool (873) and James Washington (392)—along with a tight end in Eric Ebron (558) who can take over some of the slot routes usually run by Smith-Schuster.

That depth, combined with the fact the 24-year-old USC product should attract widespread interest, makes it no surprise he'll likely don a new jersey in 2021 despite his interest in staying with the club that selected him in the second round of the 2017 draft.

"At the end of the day, I want to have my legacy in Pittsburgh and retire there," Smith-Schuster told TMZ Sports last week. "I don't want to leave."

The Steelers' running back situation is a little more cloudy. They have Benny Snell Jr., Anthony McFarland Jr., Jaylen Samuels and Trey Edmunds under contract for next season, but none of them have proved themselves as a No. 1 NFL rusher.

Conner, who averaged 4.3 yards per carry in 2020 and has scored 26 total touchdowns in 50 games with Pittsburgh, was effective in the lead role over the past three years.

Pittsburgh must decide whether to utilize a committee approach and hope one of the four remaining backs can enjoy a breakout year in 2021 or perhaps use an early draft pick on a top prospect to lead the backfield.

The Steelers, who threw 656 passes last season compared to 373 rushing attempts, should remain a pass-heavy attack next season, which does take a little pressure off the search for Conner's replacement.

In addition, it's hard to blame the front office for trying to keep as many players together as possible from a defense that ranked third in both yards and points allowed in 2020.

Most of the chatter surrounding the hyped 2021 NFL impending free-agent wide receiver class has focused on recent Super Bowl champion and one-time 1,300-yard wideout Chris Godwin of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, three-time 1,100-yard Chicago Bears veteran Allen Robinson II and physically enticing two-time 1,000-yard Detroit Lions receiver Kenny Golladay.

But at least a pair of wide receivers garnering significantly less attention ahead of free agency deserve more consideration, especially if they come cheaper as a result. After all, for the first time ever, the salary cap is expected to drop substantially in 2021, and a lot of teams will struggle to make ends meet.

So instead of splurging on Godwin, Robinson or Golladay—all of whom have their warts—teams in pursuit of free agents at that position would be smart to consider that the league's top two players in terms of yards per target in 2020 are currently on track to hit the open market.

Neither is named Godwin, Robinson or Golladay.

In a breakout season in which he ranked first in yards per target and ninth among qualified receivers in yards per game, 2016 Houston Texans first-round pick Will Fuller V truly arrived.

If not for a late-season suspension for violating the NFL's policy on performance-enhancing substances, Fuller would have easily gone over 1,000 yards with double-digit touchdowns despite playing for a bad team.

Meanwhile, after stars Odell Beckham Jr. and Jarvis Landry often trumped him during his first four seasons in the league, Rashard Higgins finally had an opportunity to shine with the Cleveland Browns in 2020. He delivered with a yards-per-target average that trailed only Fuller in a drop-free campaign.

The 2016 fifth-round pick might not be as gifted as any of the receivers mentioned thus far, but he put up 294 yards and scored twice in his final four regular-season games and was the Browns' leading receiver in their Divisional Playoff matchup with the Kansas City Chiefs.

Those guys don't have the profiles associated with Godwin, Robinson and Golladay, or even popular impending free-agent receivers like JuJu Smith-Schuster of the Pittsburgh Steelers, T.Y. Hilton of the Indianapolis Colts or Corey Davis of the Tennessee Titans. But the reality is all six of those players are far from being sure-things.

• Godwin was merely a third-round pick in 2017 and he's fallen short of the 900-yard mark in three of his four seasons. His stock could be inflated by that off-the-charts 2019 campaign, but it's entirely possible he's a one-year wonder and will fail to live up to expectations elsewhere. We also have little evidence that he can excel as a true No. 1 receiver without benefiting from the presence of a star like Mike Evans. 
• Robinson is an exceptional player who consistently delivered in a weak offense the last three years in Chicago, but he did drop seven passes in 2019 and is entering his eighth season. It's possible he's peaked. 
• Hamstring and hip injuries were just the latest afflictions suffered by Golladay, who missed all but five games in 2020 and has made it through just one complete season in his four-year career. His durability makes him a questionable investment ahead of his age-28 season. 
• Smith-Schuster is only 24, but after averaging 78.1 yards per game in his first two seasons, that rate plummeted to 49.4 the last two years. Drops have also been an issue, and he arguably became a distracting presence in Pittsburgh down the stretch in 2020.
• Hilton is a four-time Pro Bowler, but he's now 31 and is coming off the worst two seasons of his career. It's fair to wonder how much more the nine-year veteran has left. 
• Davis is intriguing because he was the No. 5 overall pick just four years ago, but he's never hit the 1,000-yard mark and he's scored just 11 touchdowns in his career. Higgins matches him there despite far fewer snaps. 

And yet, all six of those guys are likely to command more money on the open market than Higgins, while several will probably earn more than Fuller.

The elephant in the room for Fuller is his suspension. For what it's worth, he has said that stemmed from a prescription medication he was using that he thought was permitted. It's possible that means he won't be any less effective and could continue to improve moving forward, but, at the very least, the ban could cause some teams to question his dependability. After all, his lack of durability was a factor prior to the 2020 campaign.

But that's exactly why Fuller could come at a discounted price, just as a limited body of work is likely to limit Higgins' windfall. The former might be a slightly larger gamble than some of the other guys listed above, while the latter might not have the same ceiling as most of them. But there's a very good chance one or both will represent more bang for someone's buck in 2021 and beyond.

One other factor to consider is this year's wide receiver draft class, whose volume of talent "rivals" a 2020 class that saw a record 13 wideouts go off the board in the first two rounds, according to Dane Brugler of The Athletic. Those guys will come even cheaper than most if not all of the aforementioned free agents that become available, which might be another reason to save some cheddar on a lower-tier option like Fuller or Higgins if you have the draft capital to grab a pass-catcher on Day 1 or Day 2 of the draft.

Everyone wants the best, but the league's most successful teams are usually smart and savvy and less splashy on the free-agent market. Some free-agent positional groups are worth spending a premium on, especially if there's a can't-miss talent at the top of everybody's list.

This wide receiver class is intriguing and deep, but the guys at the top are not worth that premium—especially with alternatives like Fuller and Higgins potentially on the table.

Brad Gagnon has covered the NFL for Bleacher Report since 2012. Follow him on Twitter: @Brad_Gagnon.