The Pittsburgh Steelers’ first preseason game was a massive opportunity for QB Justin Fields to cement his status as a contender in the quarterback competition with Russell Wilson. Fields had worked with the first-team offense for nearly all of the first 10 practices before Wilson started ramping up his participation. He was up and down at times throughout the practices, but really started to turn some heads over the last week or so.
Mike Tomlin set the stage by saying it “very much is a competition” during his Wednesday press conference. He also described how preseason games are weighted more than practice because they are closer to the real thing. It felt like Fields had a real opportunity to enter the final stretch of camp with a real chance at winning the job.
The plan was for starters to play two drives, but Fields and the skill position players stayed in for a third while the linemen subbed out. In those three drives, Fields completed five of his six passes for 67 yards and a deceptively good 113.2 passer rating. He had a nice completion to Van Jefferson for 20 yards across the middle of the field. He also showed off his athleticism on a scramble to create a couple yards from nothing. But that box score is missing the context of two botched exchanges with the center and two sacks taken.
“There was some encouraging signs when he got the ball off,” Herm Edwards said on ESPN’s Sports Center after the Steelers’ 20-12 loss to the Houston Texans. “But there’s also some signs that show disappointment in the fact that they were really sloppy on offense. Ball exchange, quarterback-center, holding the ball too long in the pocket at times. We saw this when he was in Chicago…He had some early completions, but at the end of the day, he kind of fell back to how he was playing in Chicago.”
Last season, Fields held onto the ball the longest of any quarterback in the league. His average time to throw was 3.12 seconds, per TruMedia. Russell Wilson was the second-longest at 2.99. Both were among the most-sacked quarterbacks. But Wilson has been much cleaner in the turnover column.
In 44 starts over the last three seasons, Wilson has 25 interceptions and 22 fumbles for a total of 47. Over that same time, Justin Fields threw 30 interceptions and fumbled 38 times for a total of 68. Whether or not you put the blame on C Nate Herbig—which he did himself—there is some shared blame with the center-quarterback exchange. Ball security can’t be an issue if you hope to win a quarterback competition.
When you only get three drives in a preseason game, four of the plays can’t be sacks and botched snaps. That is too much negativity to overcome on three drives, and a large reason why the Steelers were held scoreless with Fields at QB.
Edwards was asked if Russell Wilson is the starter right now.
“No doubt, Russell Wilson is the starter. And now Justin Fields, will he have a role? I think he might have a role, maybe a slash role when the season starts,” Edwards said. “But right now it’s Russell Wilson’s job to lose when the season starts.”
Wilson has had pole position all along. Tomlin reiterated it at the beginning of camp. And the initial depth chart had Wilson over Fields. Heck, Wilson even led the team out of the tunnel at the beginning of the game.
Fields will have an opportunity to bounce back and still has plenty of time to continue showing the team his capabilities. But the needle has moved back toward Wilson while he wasn’t even on the field.
