March Madness is everywhere you look, so we here at Steel City Underground felt like getting in on the craze with a Steelers-inspired tournament all our own: Steelers Who Marched Us to Madness.

The concept is simple. Over a period of the last five seasons, there have been a number of additions the Steelers have made who came in with high expectations. Several of those additions ended as subtractions for one reason or another, leaving Pittsburgh after a disappointing run with the franchise.

We have compiled eight of those names into a March Madness-style tournament, with you, the fans, voting on who was the most disappointing acquisition who “marched us to madness”.

Note: realizing this could be a bit insensitive to the actual player discussed, we would like to remind everyone that the tournament only involves past players and you should only consider their time with the Steelers when voting or leaving comments. This is merely an entertainment exercise to gauge fan expectation versus how a player’s tenure in Pittsburgh turned out, which may have been disappointing for any variety of reasons.

Let’s look at today’s participant.

Dri Archer

Fans instantly loathed the selection of Archer to the Steelers in the 2014 NFL Draft. It wasn’t that Archer, a versatile all-purpose back in college was a bad player. It was assumed that the Steelers “reached” for him in the third round. Running back wasn’t a pressing need for Pittsburgh (they selected Le’Veon Bell a year earlier) and several analysts felt that Archer could’ve been taken in later rounds.

They also predicted that Dri was too small to handle the everyday rigors of the pros.

Regardless, some surmised that Archer could be one of the hybrid players Todd Haley had been looking to fit into his offense. The team had previously tried out similar style backs such as LaRod Stephens-Howling and Chris Rainey to no avail. Archer could have potentially played in the backfield or lined up at wide receiver, in addition to returning kicks (a skill he excelled at in college).

Unfortunately, Archer would also fail to find his footing in the league.

In two seasons with the Steelers, Archer would receive a grand total of 10 carries, all in the 2014 season. He would receive a single carry in the Steelers 2014 Wild Card Game against the Baltimore Ravens; one in which they would be without Le’Veon Bell. The team instead chose to play practice squad player Josh Harris, and sign street free agent Ben Tate, over playing Archer.

He would appear in 12 games for the Steelers in 2014, fighting injuries which would limit his playing time. He would return all of nine kickoffs, and a single punt that season. In 2015, he would appear in eight games, returning 14 kicks.

The Steelers cut him in early November of 2015.

Who’s your pick?

Vote now for who you feel was more disappointing as a Steeler:

#Steelers who marched us to madness – round 1
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— 𝗦𝘁𝗲𝗲𝗹 𝗖𝗶𝘁𝘆 𝗨𝗻𝗱𝗲𝗿𝗴𝗿𝗼𝘂𝗻𝗱 (@steelcityundrgr) March 21, 2017