Last week former NFL quarterback Chris Simms began his annual quarterback rankings. The first Pittsburgh Steelers quarterback to make the list was rookie Kenny Pickett who checked in at #39 out of 40. Simms continued his list this week on his Unbuttoned Podcast listing his #30-26 rankings.
And thats when he came to the Steelers current starter, Mitchell Trubisky. Trubisky was ranked at #27 between Marcus Mariota at #28, and Jameis Winston at #26. Mariota has been a back up for a few years, and Winston is coming off of a torn ACL that derailed his 2021 season. Now Mariota is set to become the starter for the Atlanta Falcons, and Winston re-signed with the New Orleans Saints to battle Taysom Hill for the starting job for a second season.
Steelers.com
Last season the Steelers went to Buffalo to play the Bills during week 1. And according to Simms the Steelers likely began their scouting of Trubisky then. They talked to some of his coaches, watched him during pre-game warm ups, and liked what they saw.
You don't think they got a good look at him in pregame warm ups and saw him in preseason and talked to some coaches up there and they were like, 'we got something here with this guy'. This guy is like a really good player, right," Simms said. "That's what happened throughout the League. What happened? He erased all the bad shit that was out there with him. And the League realized, okay, actually, he might not be perfect, but it wasn't all him. It was more Chicago than him. And I think that's why he got put in the spot in Pittsburgh. And I think it's going to be tough for Kenny Pickett to beat him out because there's real tangible talent with this guy.
Simms believes that the offense in Chicago was partly for why Trubisky struggled while he was there. He says to look at Nick Foles, and Andy Dalton. Both went there, both played like crap, and both are gone. And they weren't terrible quarterbacks in this league.
"He can take off," Simms said of Trubisky's running ability. "I mean, he's a really good athlete. There's a reason he was drafted in the top five. It's not like there's void of some real physical, tangible talent. The arm is strong, it's stronger than some of the quarterbacks we're going to have in the top half of the game and then it's an athletic ability that's up there with a lot of the top athletes at the position too. So that's why he is where he is. And I think the year of growth and the fact that I now know a year away from Chicago that it was more Chicago than it was him because you know who else went to Chicago look like [crap]? Nick Foles gone, Andy Dalton gone. Everybody looks like [crap] in Chicago with Matt Nagy's offense."
Simms compared the way Ben Roethlisberger was able to throw down field in 2021 to what Trubisky was working with in 2020. And he said that the Steelers will provide Trubisky with a lot more weapons than Chicago had back then.
Forget he didn't have Chase Claypool, Diontae Johnson and some of those other receivers that [Pittsburgh] did either... But from a base point to what you're talking about, that's where I would be excited, because one okay, his arms stronger than Ben's was at the end of his career. He's obviously a better athlete and be able to run. He would be willing to stand in there and take shots and throw the ball down the football field. And Trubisky is almost like the opposite Big Ben to a degree, or almost the opposite of a Mariota to a degree that we talked about where I'd like him to be a little bit more of a machine throwing the football, which he showed a little bit again and was what I heard up there in the preseason last year was like just again, those throws, the throws we saw in the regular season, they just went, man, everyone was kind of a perfect spiral on target, right. Like it was a different look.
Simms thinks that Trubisky can still find his way in the NFL. He also doesn't think that the Steelers should throw Pickett to the wolves by putting him in a position at the beginning of the season where he needs to play against Cincinnati, New England, and Cleveland.
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