The Pittsburgh Steelers were thrown yet another curveball with their starting quarterback for the regular-season opener on Sunday. Russell Wilson was named the starter last week over Justin Fields, but some calf tightness he experienced during Thursday’s practice has left his status up in the air.
The Steelers’ final injury report today listed him as questionable. NFL rules define that as a 50-50 toss-up on a player’s availability for the game.
That uncertainty will likely follow the team until 90 minutes before kickoff when the game day inactives list is required to be submitted by both teams.
Wilson was asked what needs to be done on his end between now and the game and whether it would be a pre-game evaluation to determine if he is available.
“Yeah, I think that’s part of it,” Wilson told the media in a video posted on the Steelers’ website. “I think it’s, yeah, just a lot of treatment today. Obviously we’ve been rolling all day today, meetings and everything else, and doing a lot of the red zone stuff and a lot of our hard work stuff. Today was a big day mentally and everything else for everybody. We got a lot of stuff done today. We had a really good practice.
“I think the most important thing is just tons of treatment and getting ready to see what I can do each day. Take it day by day.”
Wilson was asked pretty directly a couple times if he anticipated playing, and he directed the conversation back to doing everything he can to be ready.
Mike Tomlin initially downplayed concern over the 35-year-old Wilson’s setback and said there would be no changes to the game plan. He also said there were no long-term concerns with the calf.
Wilson was asked if this was a reaggravation, or something getting worse.
“No, there was good news there. There wasn’t something worse—extremely worse—or anything like that,” he said. “So that was good news.”
So the injury isn’t anything major, but the last time that was said it resulted in two-and-a-half weeks of Wilson unable to fully practice at training camp. At his age, the nagging soft-tissue injuries are a concern, and it will continue to be one until he can play a full 60 minutes as the Steelers’ starting quarterback.
Now all focus shifts to 11:30 AM/ET for the inactives list to be announced to see if Wilson is available or not.
