Ray Fittipaldo: Calvin Austin III has quieted the talk of Steelers needing a No. 2 WR

Ray Fittipaldo, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette on Sep 11, 2025

Published in Football

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PITTSBURGH — If you listened closely enough this summer, the Steelers weren’t fretting over their receiving corps the way many on the outside were.

General manager Omar Khan made his feelings known on the first day of training camp when he was asked for the umpteenth time about acquiring a No. 2 receiver before the season started.

“I'll be honest with you, we made a lot of moves this year, and I feel really good about where our team is right now,” Khan said on July 23. “So, to say that we're out there trying to find someone, that's not the case.”

And yet, every time a big-name receiver is unhappy or rumored to be on the trade block, he’s connected to the Steelers. On Tuesday, it was Tyreek Hill, who apparently wants out of Miami.

At one point or another in the past six months, every big-name free agent or anyone on the outs with his current team has been linked to the Steelers in some form or fashion.

Khan was confident for a reason. He believed all along Calvin Austin III was going to take another step in his development.

At 5-foot-8 and 170 pounds, Austin doesn’t have prototypical size for the position, but he sure looked the part in the season-opening victory against the Jets when he caught four passes for 70 yards and a touchdown in the 34-32 victory.

“I hear it,” Austin said after practice Wednesday afternoon. “No matter what any of us do, there will continue to be talk about that. That’s just football. That’s just media. That’s just fandom. That’s just the NFL. But no matter what is said, this is what I love to do. I’ve been on this track since before a lot of the fans or media knew who I was. Talk is the last thing that would derail me from trying to get better.”

Austin has been proving people wrong since he was old enough to carry a ball in his hands. He credits his father, Calvin Austin II, for his quiet confidence.

When he was younger, he would compete against his older cousins.

“They’d never take it easy on me,” Austin said.

If his dad took him to the gym to play basketball, he’d spot older kids and instruct them to play his son 1-on-1.

“I had to play them,” Austin said. “That’s what it was. That’s all I know. That’s been in me since I was younger. He would put me in competitive scenarios, and he would let me figure it out. That’s why I am the way I am.”

It has prepared him to compete against corners who tower over him. Steelers quarterback Aaron Rodgers targeted Austin twice on back-shoulder throws, trusting Austin to come down with the ball in a combat-catch scenario. He caught one of them for a 30-yard gain and should have drawn a pass interference penalty on the other.

“It’s all due to my pops,” Austin said. “Throughout the process, you’re a walk-on, you earn a scholarship, you get drafted. The confidence is in the work you put in. The more work you do, it breeds more confidence. It’s not verbal confidence. The confidence is how you carry yourself and how you play.”

Rodgers has been a big backer of Austin since they got to know each other when Rodgers invited the receivers to his Malibu home in June. Even with Austin missing three weeks of practice in training due to an injury, the rapport with Rodgers remained.

Rodgers targeted Austin six times in the game, and he said it wasn’t enough.

“I have to get him more opportunities,” Rodgers said. “I had a chance on a third-and-10 with about six minutes to go to throw it to him over the middle. I have to get him involved more.”

If the Jets game was any indication, Rodgers is going to spread the ball around. Seven players caught passes for the Steelers, and four different receivers caught touchdowns. Only DK Metcalf was targeted more than Austin.

For one game at least, the chatter about the receiving corps has died down. Austin aims to keep it that way, but don’t count on him to be bothered by the outside noise.

He doesn’t have time for it.

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