While the Pittsburgh Steelers have yet to formally announce the signing of free agent safety Morgan Burnett, some numbers related to the contract he’s reportedly agreed to are now surfacing.
According to Ian Rapoport of the NFL Network, Burnett has agreed to a three-year contract with the Steelers that is worth close to $14.5 million.
If Rapoport’s total contract value numbers are correct, it will mean the former Green Bay Packers safety will have an average yearly value of around $4.8 million. That’s a little less per year than the contract that former Steelers safety Mike Mitchell signed as a free agent in 2014. Mitchell was released by the Steelers early last week and he was previously scheduled to earn a base salary of $5 million in 2018.
We have yet to learn how big the signing bonus is for Burnett and what his base salaries for the three years will be, but his 2018 salary cap charge should be affordable from salary cap perspective just the same.
Rapoport goes on to report that Burnett’s deal will net him $10 million plus over the course of the first two years of the contract.
Last week, the Houston Texans signed free agent safety Tyrann Mathieu to a one-year contract that reportedly has a maximum value of $7 million. The free agent safety market has been extremely slow nearly one full week into the new league year.
Burnett has spent his entire NFL career with the Packers after being drafted by them in the third-round of the 2010 NFL Draft out of Georgia Tech. Last season, Burnett missed four games to groin and hamstring injuries. He did, however, still manage to register 68 total tackles, three defensed passes and a forced fumble in the 12 games that he did play in. The Steelers new safety, however, has only played in all 16 games of a regular season just two times in his eight years in the NFL.
Burnett, as Alex Kozora has already posted, is a very versatile safety and has shown to be solid run defender inside the box throughout his career. Last season he registered 36 run tackles, according to Pro Football Reference.
We will pass along more reports to you on Burnett soon along with the complete details of the contract he signed as soon as they are made known.
UPDATE: The Steelers have now announced the signing of Burnett so it’s officially official.
