Pittsburgh Steelers restricted free agent wide receiver Mike Wallace is one of two unsigned players who is absent (i.e., not a holdout) from his team's training camp.
Wallace wants a long-term deal to replace his non-guaranteed tender worth $2.742 million, and he has skipped the Steelers' OTAs, minicamp and the first nine practices of training camp.
Steelers general manager Kevin Colbert told KDKA-FM that there's been no contact between the two sides.
"Yeah there's really no contact," Colbert said, via SportsRadioInterviews.com. "Mike knows where things stand. The next step for him really is to report and to sign his tender, and until that happens, there won't be anything else. And if that happens, nobody knows where it will go from there.
"So that's where it is and has been, and hopefully it comes to an end sooner rather than later because it will be good for us, but it will also be good for Mike."
The Steelers signed fellow receiver Antonio Brown to a five-year, $41.96 million contract, but Colbert said that had nothing to do with the Wallace situation. Considering Brown received just $8.5 million in guaranteed money in his deal, that's probably true. Still, the Brown deal raised questions about Wallace's future in Black & Gold.
One option that is not on the table, however, is a trade, a scenario that quickly was shot down.
"No, Mike's not available (in a trade)," Colbert said. "We have as big a need for a big-play receiver as anybody. We want him to be here and Mike wants to be here long term. So he's not available."
The Steelers are making it clear that a trade is off the table and that a long-term deal won't happen until he signs his tender and reports. Since Wallace made fewer than $2 million on his rookie contract, he'll likely sign his tender to double his career earnings in 2012. That might not happen until sometime between the Steelers breaking camp August 17 and the start of the regular season.
