Pittsburgh Steelers fans are still waiting to see who the team’s starting quarterback will be in 2025. Aaron Rodgers seems like the most likely answer, but there’s no telling what he’ll decide to do. Russell Wilson is also still available, so perhaps a reunion is possible there. However, if the Steelers miss out on both of them, where should they turn? Former NFL corner Jason McCourty believes they should consider moving up in the draft.
“You have to think about mortgaging the future to possibly go up and get one of these quarterbacks,” McCourty said Friday on ESPN’s Unsportsmanlike. “If you do your evaluations, because to me, they have to have been evaluating Cam Ward, Shedeur Sanders, Jaxson Dart, all of these guys throughout the draft.
“If you come to the determination that you believe that one of these guys is a franchise leader and a quarterback for the next 10-to-15 years and you just assumed he’d be on another guy’s team, you have to start to think what package of picks, possibly players, that we can send to get one of those guys.”
That’s not a bad suggestion. If the Steelers can’t sign Rodgers or Wilson, the other free agent quarterbacks don’t look too appealing. They’d be left to pick from the likes of Jameis Winston and Joe Flacco. At that point, finally hitting the reset button under center doesn’t seem too bad.
It’s not like the Steelers are guaranteed to sign Rodgers or Wilson, either. Rodgers is reportedly choosing between Pittsburgh and the New York Giants. He also reportedly has some interest in playing for the Minnesota Vikings. Wilson just had a meeting with the Cleveland Browns and is also drawing interest from the Giants. The Steelers might have to turn to the draft.
However, there are a lot of issues with that plan. For starters, the Steelers just traded their second-round pick this year for DK Metcalf. They’re already a little light on draft capital.
Also, quarterback doesn’t look like a strength of the 2025 draft. Ward seems to be the top signal caller, but that would likely force the Steelers to move up into the top three picks, if not number one overall. That would cost a fortune, and doing all that for a quarterback that still has a lot of flaws seems rash.
Sanders and Dart look to be the next best quarterbacks available, but opinions seem to be split on where they’ll be drafted. Some analysts have even speculated that they’d fall to the Steelers’ current pick at 21. Is it worth it to sacrifice a treasure chest of draft picks for a guy like that?
Moving up in the draft isn’t ideal, but the Steelers are running out of options. If Rodgers and Wilson go elsewhere, they’ll be stuck in a bad spot. They could always make a play to trade for Kirk Cousins, but there’s no guarantee the Atlanta Falcons want to move him. The Steelers might be stuck looking to the draft for their starting quarterback.
