With Colorado QB Shedeur Sanders still surprisingly on the board at No. 83 overall Friday night in the third round of the 2025 NFL Draft — along with Alabama QB Jalen Milroe — the Pittsburgh Steelers had an opportunity to address the position with some great value.
Instead, the Steelers stuck to their board and drafted Iowa’s Kaleb Johnson at No. 83 overall, giving Pittsburgh a true No. 1, workhorse running back once again after the loss of Najee Harris.
Passing on the Sanders not once, but twice, signals that the Steelers aren’t all that interested in taking a big swing at the QB position in the 2025 NFL Draft. That lines up with the comments that team owner and president Art Rooney II said Friday night on Steeler Nation Radio, stating that the Steelers might go QB and are targeting a developmental piece.
Sanders is arguably the most pro-ready quarterback in the class, so he doesn’t exactly fit that mold. So, the Steelers passed not once, but twice, addressing defensive line and running back, building through the vision of GM Omar Khan and assistant GM Andy Weidl a physical, punishing team.
While the Steelers are sticking to their board and building through an identity, the quarterback position remains a major question mark as they continue to wait on Aaron Rodgers, whom Rooney said may give them an answer soon.
Sanders could have been that answer. He still might be, depending on if he continues to fall. The Colorado star came to town for a pre-draft visit and raved about his meeting with the Steelers. Head coach Mike Tomlin raved about Sanders, too, during the Steelers’ pre-draft press conference. But there were a few reports that Sanders didn’t interview well across the league, and even one report that his interview with Pittsburgh was poor, though that was later shot down by Tomlin.
Those reports about his attitude and preparation in the pre-draft process led to some polarization on Sanders, causing him to fall down the boards from where he was initially in the pre-draft process as seemingly a top-10 lock. Pittsburgh at No. 21 seemed like the logical destination to stop his slide, but that wasn’t the case Thursday night in Green Bay.
Then, he slide through the second and third rounds Friday night, too.
Across two seasons at Colorado after two seasons at Jackson State, Sanders put up some impressive numbers. He passed for 7,364 yards with 64 touchdowns and just 13 interceptions, completing 71.8% of his passes.
In a scouting report for Steelers Depot, Steven Pavelka had this to say about Sanders, whom he compared to Andy Dalton.
“A few things are certain about Sanders: he is a proven winner who excels in accuracy from the pocket while bringing confidence that teams and players will love. However, he is not a guaranteed game-changer. A few measurables, being slightly below average, like age and height, will be overlooked. He struggles with being less mobile than most of the quarterbacks in his class, not throwing the ball away, which leads to too many sacks, and attempting too many unnecessarily difficult passes.”
Dalton, for what it’s worth, was a second-round pick at No. 35 overall in the 2011 NFL Draft. Sanders is still on the board. We’ll see if he lasts until No. 123 overall on Saturday afternoon in the fourth round for the Steelers.
