The Pittsburgh Steelers and Aaron Rodgers have dominated headlines throughout the offseason, especially as we get into the dog days of the summer. Whether Rodgers will sign with the Steelers or not remains up in the air, but that hasn’t stopped anyone from having their opinions on the potential signing. One recent take comes from a guy who happens to understand the quarterback position pretty well.
Former NFL quarterback Kurt Warner joined The Jim Rome Show on Friday, and he wants to see if Rodgers can show some more improvement after a strong end to the 2024 season.
“The biggest thing for me is, I want to see him a year removed from the injury and back healthy and not trying to rush himself out there and see if he improves on the things that we saw at the end of the year,” Warner said.
Rodgers injured his Achilles on the first drive of the 2023 season. Suiting up about a year later seems like a decent recovery time for any injury. However, Achilles injuries are notoriously harder to come back from. That could be why Rodgers started to look better towards the end of last season, as Warner alludes to.
He’s still not mobile, by any means. However, it’s hard to argue with the fact that he simply looked more comfortable moving around and getting himself set to throw the ball during the final games of last season. The Jets were far out of contention by the times those games came along. However, Rodgers had the Jets looking much better during the final weeks of the season.
Whether that’s Rodgers truly improving or just garbage-time numbers is going to be up to the Steelers to find out. Unfortunately, it doesn’t seem like they have another choice. Still, Warner does think the Steelers are a better team with Rodgers in 2025.
“I think the Steelers are better with Aaron Rodgers at quarterback than what they had last year,” Warner said. “If we get anything like what Aaron did at the end of last year, I think they’re a better football team with him… I do think he’s an upgrade for them and makes them a better football team.”
The Steelers did get quality quarterback play, at times, in 2024. However, it just wasn’t enough, especially towards the end of the year. Russell Wilson had fans excited to begin his time as starter, winning six of his first seven. Then, while it wasn’t entirely his fault, Wilson and the Steelers collectively played some terrible football to end the year, adding the final touches on yet another season ending in disappointment.
With Rodgers, the Steelers would be hoping to skip that late-season slide this time around. At his age, many wonder whether he can still handle a full NFL slate. Yet, he did put some of his best performances together toward the end of the 2024 season. The Steelers don’t have another choice. They still could have an upgrade if Rodgers does sign, which seems likely at this point.
