Pittsburgh Steelers rookie running back Kaleb Johnson has had a brutal week. In the days after his mistake handling a kickoff that led to a game-changing touchdown for the Seattle Seahawks, the Iowa product has been blasted in the media for his miscue.

In my own personal opinion, Johnson’s blunder reflects poorly on the coaching staff as well, not just him. I wrote about that on Wednesday.

It also seems that mistake has cost him his role as kick returner. When asked about it on Tuesday, head coach Mike Tomlin said that Johnson won’t be returning kicks in the “short term.” Tomlin, however, has yet to say who might replace him in the kick return game.

All this talk of Johnson has led to many, myself included, wonder why Johnson was ever deployed as a kick returner in the first place. And while there’s plenty of valid questioning to do as to why the Steelers even put Johnson in that position, he is just the latest in a long lime of odd and unconventional kick returners for the Steelers.

I got the idea for this piece listening to 93.7 The Fan on Thursday, where Joe Starkey and Bob Pompeani were discussing some of the wacky kick returners the Steelers had.

Fitzgerald Toussaint, Mewelde Moore, Benny Snell Jr., Kerrith Whyte Jr, Anthony McFarland Jr., Terrell Watson, Cobi Hamilton, Sammie Coats, Gunner Olszewski, and Najeh Davenport all got mentions.

But I wanted to dive even further down the list, because believe it or not, there’s even more obscure names who have returned a kick for the club over the last ten years or so.

Some of these guys returning kicks made sense, some of them didn’t. Some of them didn’t. But any of these guys might be guys that you forgot returned kicks, and in some cases, were even Steelers at all.

Aaron Shampklin, 2024

Shampklin was not the plan the Steelers had to return kicks last year. In the first season of the dynamic kickoff (which has since been further revised), the Steelers signed legendary return man Cordarrelle Patterson to fill the job for the team.

But the 33-year-old contributed to the worst kick return average in the NFL, and also spent some time sidelined by injury. Such was the case when Shampklin was returning kicks.

Patterson missed a Week 5 contest last year when Pittsburgh hosted Dallas, and the Steelers opted to put Shampklin in that spot. He returned four kicks that night, totaling 101 yards. Though it was a small sample size, his 25.3 average was actually the best of any kick returner for the Steelers last year.

Ironically, his long was the worst of any Steelers kick returner. He returned one for 32 yards coming out of the half vs the Cowboys.

Desmond King, 2023

King’s saga in Pittsburgh was incredibly short and incredibly weird. He was a last minute addition to the Steelers right before the 2023 season. A safety who also excelled at special teams and in the return game, King had once returned a punt for a touchdown against the Steelers back in 2018.

Five years later, he suited up in black and yellow…kind of. He was inactive for the first two weeks of the season before finally making his debut in Week 3 in Las Vegas. Despite bringing defensive depth with him to the team, he only took special teams snaps and did not return a ball in that game.

It would take another week for King to get his first touch, returning three kicks for 69 total yards in a blowout loss against his old team in Houston. His last kick return in that game, a 27-yard gain to the 28-yard line, stood as the best of his four returns.

The next week, he returned once for 19 yards and took his first (and literally only) defensive snap for the Steelers against Baltimore. He was cut shortly after, with the Steelers cycling several different guys in the return game in King’s absence.

James Pierre, 2022

If there’s a silver lining for Johnson in all of this, it’s that he is not alone in having a bad gaffe. Pierre knows a thing or two about struggles in the kickoff return.

After Gunner Olszewski was reduced in the return game, the Steelers deployed a few other players in that role, including Pierre. The cornerback by trade took a grand total of one kick return for the Steelers, in a blowout loss on the road against the Bills.

Interestingly enough in that game, he wasn’t the only returner to mess up. On the opening kickoff of the game, Bills return man Taiwan Jones dropped the return and scooped it up just in time to be chopped down at the 2-yard line. Fortunately for him, his quarterback Josh Allen bailed him out with a 98-yard touchdown pass to Gabe Davis.

Pierre, meanwhile, experienced an even worse blunder on the very next kickoff. On a short kick sent him sprinting upward, the ball smacked in and out of Pierre’s arms and chest, bouncing to the field where it was eventually recovered by Buffalo’s Taron Johnson.

Although his mistake led to a turnover, Pierre did get partially bailed out by his team; the defense blocked the subsequent field goal attempt to keep more points off the board.

Steven Sims would take over for Pierre in that game, and would go on to serve as the main kick returner in Pittsburgh for the rest of the year.

Johnny Holton, 2019

One of the many obscure names of the 2019 Steelers, Holton was one of five kick returners the team deployed that season. His work in the return game came early in the year, where he returned two kicks in a 24-20 loss to San Francisco and one in a 26-23 overtime loss to Baltimore.

In total, he gained 55 yards on returns, averaging 18.3 and never getting more than 21 yards on a return.

He was one of several players who only made spot appearances as a kick returner that season. Ryan Switzer and the aforementioned Kerrith Whyte Jr. took the bulk of the action.

In the receiving game, Holton recorded three catches on 15 targets for 21 yards. He also attempted one rush for nine yards, totaling 85 all-purpose yards.

Tony Brooks-James, 2019

From one obscure 2019 Steeler to another, Brooks-James also moonlit as a temporary kick returner for the team that season. Unlike several of the other players on this list, Brooks-James actually did have kickoff return experience. He racked up over 1,000 return yards in college at Oregon.

The running back’s selling point was his speed, which made using him as a kick returner interesting at least. However, it didn’t really work. He returned two kicks in that game for 16 yards each, never reaching past the 22-yard line. He got one rushing attempt in that game, a loss of four yards on Pittsburgh’s final offensive play.

It was his last of three games as a Steeler. At least he didn’t get smacked in the head with his own helmet.

Justin Gilbert, 2016

By the time Gilbert arrived in Pittsburgh, his stock had taken quite a hit.

The eighth overall pick by Cleveland in 2014, Gilbert had eight passes defended and one interception (which he returned for a touchdown). But after a quiet, nine-game season in 2015, the cornerback was available for a measly sixth round pick to the Steelers ahead of the 2016 season.

One area where he did have some success in Cleveland was in the return game. His final season with the Browns saw him return 12 kicks for an average of 28.3 yards.

Unfortunately for Gilbert, he didn’t have as many reps or success as a kick returner in Pittsburgh. He returned two kicks for 37 yards in a 30-15 loss in Miami, and ripped off a 32-yard return the following week in a 27-16 loss to New England.

It was another crowded year at kick returner for the Steelers; five different men returned at least once and Gilbert had the second-lowest kick return attempts on the roster in the regular season.

Gilbert did return some kicks in the postseason, but to little avail. He returned two kicks for 26 yards in a Divisional Round over Kansas City (which still stands as the team’s most recent playoff win), and one for 17 yards in another loss to the Patriots a week later.