Two games into the season, the Pittsburgh Steelers have yet to see Russell Wilson. He has only dressed as an emergency quarterback for those contests, officially listed as inactive. Increasingly, many are pushing for Justin Fields to retain the starting job. Even if he does, however, he will still have Wilson lurking behind him.
And eventually in front of him, Chris Hoke believes. “We’re going to need him at some point this season”, he said on KDKA Nightly Sports Call Sunday, though not necessarily immediately. “If [Fields] is winning and he’s not turning the ball over, Coach [Mike] Tomlin’s going to keep going with him”.
But Hoke doesn’t sound like he thinks Fields is going to keep protecting the ball, and if he doesn’t, that is going to jeopardize wins. Let’s not forget, the Steelers have scored 18 and 13 points this year, which would lose most games. With or without Russell Wilson, they are relying on their defense to pitch virtual shutouts. Because let’s face it, in today’s game, holding an opponent to 10 points is just about a shutout.
The curious question is how much time Justin Fields has left to state his case. Russell Wilson could still miss at least another game or two after aggravating his calf injury. If he has a couple games in which he scores 24-plus points in wins, it would be hard to pull him.
“As long as [Fields is] producing wins and not turning the ball over, they’re going to keep going with him”, Hoke said. “But if he doesn’t play like he did in the first half [in Denver], Russell Wilson’s going to come in and play once he’s healthy. So it’s going to depend on what kind of guy we see against the Chargers in Acrisure Stadium next Sunday”.
The Steelers only managed three first downs in all of the second half yesterday. They went three and out on four of seven drives with just 93 net yards, much of it via penalty. If we see more of the second half than the first half for Fields, that would be good news for Wilson.
And the Steelers’ next opponent is the Los Angeles Chargers, who have given up even fewer points than Pittsburgh. If they have just as good of a defense and a better offense, that’s a problem. Of course, if QB Justin Herbert can’t play, that levels the playing field some.
It will be very interesting this week to see what happens if Russell Wilson is a full participant in practice. In fact, it will be very interesting to see what Tomlin says about Justin Fields on Tuesday. Amazingly, reporters seemingly didn’t have the energy to ask him about the starting quarterback situation after the Steelers’ 13-6 win in Denver. Normally they love asking questions they know he isn’t going to answer.
