PITTSBURGH — Steelers defensive lineman and reigning Walter Payton NFL Man of the Year Cameron Heyward has not attended voluntary offseason workouts and does not plan to attend OTAs as he seeks a contract extension, sources told ESPN’s Jeremy Fowler. Heyward, set to become a free agent in 2025, has never missed an offseason program.

Heyward, 35, has registered the most defensive stops since 2019 with 242, via Next Gen Stats, and has the third-most sacks among interior rushers during that span with 58.5. Heyward plans to play several more years and is healthy from last year’s core muscle injury, a source told Fowler.

Heyward started dealing with the core muscle injury during the 2023 training camp and ended up missing six games when a fall tore his groin muscle in Week 1 and required surgery. But he returned ahead of schedule to play the final 10 games. Heyward, the longest-tenured Steeler and a longtime captain, was adamant in his desire to continue playing a day after the Steelers’ wild-card loss to the Buffalo Bills.

“Of course, I want to play; in my mind, I want to play more than just one more season,” Heyward said in January. “I’ve just got to get healthy first. We talk about coming back from injury, I was told at the time it was a 12-week process, and we came back in six weeks. I fought the doctors every week.

“I just wanted to put my hand in that pile. But the flip side of that is I put my body through a lot of pain this year. It was getting me to the stadium and go from there, but I can’t be doing that year in and year out.”

Heyward is in the final year of a four-year, $65 million extension signed in 2020 and is scheduled to count $22.4 million against the 2024 salary cap.