Player: QB Mason Rudolph
Stock Value: Sold
Reasoning: Though the circumstances remain somewhat oblique, the fact is Mason Rudolph is no longer a member of the Pittsburgh Steelers. After six years, he’s moved on, signing a one-year contract with the Tennessee Titans. There, he faces the prospect of contending with second-year man Will Levis, the presumed starter. Meanwhile, his former team completely cleaned out the quarterback room and is restocking it.
Mason Rudolph signed with the Titans a bit ago by now, but we’re still playing catchup, natural with free agency. Moves often tend to happen in clumps, so covering them one at a time, you’re looking at a certain backlog.
After covering all of the new players the Steelers acquired, we’re looping back to some of those who departed. Nobody among those spent more time in Pittsburgh than QB Mason Rudolph. A 2018 third-round pick, his folk hero status finally surpassed that of Duck Hodges around Christmas 2023.
That is when head coach Mike Tomlin plugged him into the starting lineup, benching the struggling Mitch Trubisky. Kenny Pickett had injured his ankle weeks ago and the Steelers tailspinned into a losing streak, accordingly. With the season on the line, he allowed Rudolph to guide his Christmas sleigh.
A good idea, as it turned out, as he put up impressive numbers in a must-win game against the Cincinnati Bengals on Christmas Eve Eve (that is, the eve of Christmas Eve). Over three starts, he went 53-for-71 passing for 716 yards, throwing three touchdowns.
Even entering the postseason, Tomlin opted to start him over Pickett, whom they had deemed by then healthy enough to play. He struggled through much of the first half but began to rally in the second before the game got out of hand.
According to the Steelers themselves, they engaged Rudolph in contract talks pretty much until the end. There are unverified accounts of how the two parties ultimately parted ways, indicating he was prepared to sign, but I’ve yet to see this from more established and vetted sources, so I’m not running with it, and neither should you.
In the end, the Steelers ended up signing Russell Wilson and trading for Justin Fields. In between, they also traded Kenny Pickett to the Philadelphia Eagles. Having already released Trubisky, the quarterback room is now entirely different.
As the season progresses, Steelers players’ stocks rise and fall. The nature of the evaluation differs with the time of year, with in-season considerations being more often short-term. Considerations in the offseason often have broader implications, particularly when players lose their jobs, or the team signs someone. This time of year is full of transactions, whether minor or major.
A bad game, a new contract, an injury, a promotion—any number of things affect a player’s value. Think of it as a stock on the market, based on speculation. You’ll feel better about a player after a good game, or worse after a bad one. Some stock updates are minor, while others are likely to be quite drastic, so bear in mind the degree. I’ll do my best to explain the nature of that in the reasoning section of each column.
