The Pittsburgh Steelers are out of Latrobe and back at the UPMC Rooney Sports Complex, also referred to as the South Side Facility. We are in a critical portion of the offseason in which the preseason takes center stage, where some of the biggest and most important questions get answered, especially in terms of personnel.
How are the rookies performing? What about the players that the team signed in free agency? Who is missing time with injuries, and when are they going to be back? What are the coaches saying about what they are going to do this season that might be different from how it was a year ago?
These are the sorts of questions among many others that we have been exploring on a daily basis and will continue to do so. Football has become a year-round pastime and there is always a question to be asked, though there is rarely a concrete answer, as I’ve learned in my years of doing this.
Question: Will Joshua Dobbs become a tradeable commodity by the time the preseason is over?
The Steelers have four quarterbacks. It is very unlikely that they will keep four quarterbacks on the 53-man roster. it’s slightly more likely, but still not probable, that they retain four between the roster and the practice squad—assuming that their fourth quarterback even clears waivers.
So the long and short of it is that, as we all know, one of the four quarterbacks with the team now is not going to be with the team in a few weeks. We know for certain that Ben Roethlisberger and rookie third-round pick Mason Rudolph will be two of the three that make the roster. The others are their backup, Landry Jones, and Joshua Dobbs, a second-year talent.
Neither Rudolph nor Dobbs have looked like a player who is prepared to be the backup to Roethlisberger in 2018, so one would have to assume that Dobbs is currently more like than Jones to receive the shortest straw and end up not on the roster come September.
Assuming that is the case—and to be clear, I’m not marking it as a guarantee—will the Steelers be able to part with him in a way that actually returns them some level of compensation? Will they be able to trade him for something of value?
Of course any player can be traded. Pittsburgh traded a random offensive lineman they’d just signed named Lucas Crowley for a special teams cornerback with NFL experience just last year. They also traded for and traded away several other players. I guess that’s their thing now.
Looking at the writing on the wall, Dobbs figures to be arguably the most likely player that they will be able to move, as they did with Sammie Coates and Ross Cockrell a year ago when they lost out in the numbers game. So if it comes down to that, will they be able to work out a trade for a player they’re likely to release, and what might they get in return for him?
