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Brooke Pryor
PALM BEACH, Fla. — The Pittsburgh Steelers aren’t getting off the quarterback carousel anytime soon. Amid a public courtship of quarterback Aaron Rodgers, coach Mike Tomlin said Sunday that the team is examining its options to add to the quarterback room.
“We’re still evaluating the acquisition of a guy at the position, whether it’s free agency and/or the draft, and so we’re doing our due diligence communicating with some free agents. Also preparing for the draft,” Tomlin said from the NFL’s annual league meeting in his first public comments since a season-ending news conference in January.
“We’re optimistic about the room that we’re constructing. Obviously, we’re excited about having Mason Rudolph back.
“But certainly we’re going to continue to explore all our options in terms of rounding that room out.”
Tomlin was coy on the specifics of the Steelers’ pursuit of the 41-year-old Rodgers, who visited the team facility for nearly six hours on March 21.
“It’s been reported that he spent a day with us, and it was a really good day,” Tomlin said. “Specifically, he and I obviously have known of each other for some time, and so it was really good to spend some time together, man, and get to know each other more intimately, but it is free agency. It is a process. I have nothing of any more significance to add other than that.”
Tomlin said there wasn’t an internal Steelers deadline to resolve the situation with Rodgers.
“Not to my knowledge,” he said. “I don’t know that we’ve approached it from a deadline perspective. Certainly, as I mentioned, you’d like to have settled circumstances, but deadlines don’t often bring that to a head.”
The Steelers’ coach added he also didn’t ask Rodgers about his timeline during their visit.
“I really wanted to spend more of our time just getting to know him better and things that he values as a player and a man, and what he might be looking for with his next stop,” he said.
Asked about a potential Plan B if Rodgers elects to go elsewhere or retire, Tomlin said the team hasn’t necessarily identified a preference.
“I don’t know if we are identifying anything as Plan A, Plan B or Plan C,” he said. “We’re just simply looking at the field of available people, whether it’s free agency or the draft and making decisions and gathering information accordingly.”
Tomlin also said he hadn’t “thought a lot” about settling the Rodgers situation before the draft and that the unresolved quarterback position hasn’t hindered the team’s free agency plans. The Steelers traded for wide receiver DK Metcalf on the eve of the negotiating period and signed free agent cornerback Darius Slay Jr. and running back Kenneth Gainwell, among others.
Though the Steelers aren’t setting a deadline on the Rodgers decision, Tomlin acknowledged that entering training camp with an incomplete quarterback room could negatively impact team development.
“In the spring, it’s about teaching and learning and getting familiar with players and making sure they’re getting familiar with some of the things that we value,” he said. “It’s not an evaluation time of the year for us. It’s certainly not a time of the year where we’re focused on readying ourselves for the game action. Certainly, training camp would kind of be a line of demarcation in terms of that discussion; the spring’s about teaching and learning.”
Downplaying the significance of having a complete quarterback position in the spring is something of a departure from Tomlin’s words a year ago, when he said it was important to place Russell Wilson in “pole position” for the starting job over Justin Fields because of his experience and veteran leadership.
“During this time where we are not formally working, man, I just think it’s beneficial,” Tomlin said at the 2024 meeting. “It just creates a synergy that I think is good for this time of year.”
Though the quarterback position is a work in progress, Tomlin acknowledged that Rudolph’s experience with the team — and Pittsburgh’s view of him as a potential starter — led to the Steelers signing him to a two-year deal.
“I think that’s why we reacquired him, man,” Tomlin said, asked if Rudolph could be “the guy.” “We like Mason Rudolph, but that’s no secret.”
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