The Pittsburgh Steelers once again have a quarterback conundrum. In two games, Mason Rudolph has looked better than Kenny Pickett has in 25 games, and Rudolph is now the starter despite Pickett being healthy enough to play. That’s led to questions about where the Steelers are headed at the quarterback position, and the Get Up panel pretty much unanimously agreed the Steelers need a quarterback not currently on the roster in 2024.
“I think they absolutely need another quarterback. It’s not gonna be Pickett or Mason Rudolph,” Foxworth said. He added that he thinks that the Steelers are a quarterback away, a sentiment Jeff Saturday agreed with. Saturday thinks the Steelers need to go the veteran quarterback route in free agency.
“Whether it’s a Kirk Cousins or a Russell Wilson, I think they need a veteran quarterback who comes in and gets this offense as a team that can push,” Saturday said.
He said with Pittsburgh’s defense and how well its offensive line is playing, a veteran would be best suited for the offense, and while Kimberley A. Martin agreed the Steelers need a new quarterback, she doesn’t think it’s a move they would make.
I just don’t understand going the veteran quarterback route for Pittsburgh. I like Cousins a good bit more than Wilson, but signing one of them just leads to a rotating cycle of trying to find the next quarterback. Neither Cousins nor Wilson has a lot of miles left in them, and it just doesn’t make a lot of sense for Pittsburgh to commit money and term to one of them, even though Wilson has been linked to the team.
However, I do think the future at quarterback doesn’t include Pickett or Rudolph. Rudolph has been awesome in his last two games, but it’s a fair question to ask whether he has a long-term future as a starter in the league. It would be awesome if he did, but it’s a tough thing for Pittsburgh to commit to with that level of uncertainty.
As far as Pickett goes, he just hasn’t looked like a capable NFL starting quarterback for most of his tenure in Pittsburgh. I do think the Steelers give him another year, though, and see how he looks in 2024 with a new offensive coordinator. Martin is right that it just doesn’t seem like a move the Steelers would make to give up on Pickett after two seasons. While he’s the backup to Rudolph now, I don’t think the Steelers go into 2024 with Pickett not starting.
While that might not be the right decision, it just feels like what Pittsburgh will do. But if the Steelers do want to make a quarterback change this offseason, I hope it’s through the draft and not by going the veteran route with a Cousins or a Wilson. While that might lead to success for a year or two, it wouldn’t matter if that success isn’t a Super Bowl victory, and then we just have the same question we have now — and had after 2021 — about what Pittsburgh’s future is at quarterback. A Band-Aid solution isn’t the answer here, and hopefully that’s not the direction the Steelers go.
