Keeanu Benton Extension: Steelers Make DT Highest-Paid D-Lineman in Team History With $72M Deal

The Pittsburgh Steelers locked up one of their most important young defenders Friday night, agreeing to a four-year, $72 million extension with defensive tackle Keeanu Benton, according to NFL Network’s Ian Rapoport. The deal carries an $18 million annual average, making Benton the highest-paid defensive lineman in franchise history.

The move comes one night after Pittsburgh’s preseason win over the Green Bay Packers and just weeks before the regular season kicks off, giving the Steelers a rare piece of roster-building news to celebrate during an otherwise unsettled offseason. Benton, a 2023 second-round pick out of Wisconsin, was entering the final year of his rookie contract and had been on track to hit the open market next spring after a $1.75 million salary this season.

How Benton Became a Cornerstone Up Front

Pittsburgh took Benton with the 49th overall pick in 2023 after a standout final two seasons at Wisconsin and a strong Senior Bowl showing. The early returns were modest — 36 tackles and a single sack as a rookie — but his role and production have climbed every year since. In 2025, Benton started all 17 games and delivered a career year with 51 tackles and 5.5 sacks, flashing the interior pass-rush ability that made this extension possible. Over three seasons, he has piled up 123 total tackles, 7.5 sacks, three forced fumbles and a fumble recovery, developing into one of the more disruptive young interior defenders in the AFC.

That trajectory is exactly why the Steelers moved now rather than letting Benton play out his rookie deal and test free agency. Locking up a 25-year-old defensive tackle who is still ascending, rather than bidding against the rest of the league next offseason, is a calculated bet that his best football is still ahead of him.

A Tight Cap Squeeze Just Got Tighter

The timing matters as much as the number. Pittsburgh is already navigating a snug salary-cap picture, with roughly $3.9 million in projected cap space for 2027 — the first year Benton’s new deal kicks in, per Over the Cap figures. The Steelers also have cornerback Joey Porter Jr. working toward a second-contract extension of his own, meaning the front office is stacking multiple long-term commitments onto a defense it clearly views as its foundation, even as the books get tighter around it.

Betting big on the defensive interior while carrying thin cap margins is a signal in itself: Pittsburgh’s front office believes Benton’s ceiling is worth the near-term cost, and that retaining a young, ascending piece up front outweighs the flexibility they’re giving up elsewhere.

What It Means for Steelers Betting Markets

From a market perspective, this is the kind of retention move that quietly reinforces a defense-driven betting profile rather than moving win-total or division numbers on its own. Pittsburgh’s 2026 season win total has been sitting at 8.5, with the under drawing more juice than the over across multiple sportsbooks, and the Steelers have carried around +550 to +625 odds to win the AFC North and roughly +5000 to win the Super Bowl. Those futures were already built around the assumption that Pittsburgh’s identity runs through its defensive front, not an explosive offense — and keeping Benton in the fold for the next four years is a direct investment in preserving that identity rather than a departure from it.

For bettors tracking the Steelers’ defensive props and team-total markets this season, the practical takeaway is continuity: the same interior presence that helped anchor a top-heavy run defense and generate rare disruption from the tackle spot in 2025 will be back, not auditioning for a new contract elsewhere. That stability matters more for weekly defensive prop consideration — sack totals, tackles-for-loss markets, and team defensive rankings — than it does for the marquee season-long futures, which will still hinge on whether Pittsburgh’s offense and quarterback situation can catch up to what the defense is now built to sustain.