The Pittsburgh Steelers concluded their preseason with a defeat to the Detroit Lions. Despite losing 24-17, the Steelers saw a lot of progress, especially on the offensive side of the ball. The first two drives in the game both resulted in touchdowns, and they didn't start allowing points until the third-team offense and defense took the field. Despite making a couple of nice plays, the Steelers opted to bench Russell Wilson after the first drive. After the situation he went through during training camp and preseason, it seemed like the Steelers would want to keep him in a bit longer.
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Steelers Quarterback Russell Wilson throwing a pass in Preseason Week 2 against the Buffalo Bills.
During his postgame press conference, Mike Tomlin defended his decision to pull Wilson early and explained his thought process behind it.
"Again, we just needed results that are indicative of how we've worked, and so, [the starters] were able to put together a scoring drive and really just provided an opportunity to get Justin [Fields] in there sooner, and so that's why we did it."
Tomlin clearly believes that he has seen enough out of Wilson in that one drive to pull him and see what Fields could do with his limited reps with the first-team offense. He talked about how his free-agent quarterback had "pole position" all offseason long, and after that decision, it seems like his mind is officially made up on who will lead this offense out on the field to begin the 2024 season.
Sebastian Foltz / Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Steelers quarterbacks Justin Fields and Russell Wilson in 2024 OTA practice
Did Steelers Truly See Enough Out Of Wilson?
In his lone drive, Wilson only completed two passes, and the first ended up losing six yards. He had a great pass to George Pickens on third and 11 to set the Steelers up for the score, but would that be enough normally? He had one completed pass that went passed the line of scrimmage. Even though it was a 29-yard pass on a possession down, does that one play mean everything for Tomlin?
The drive got kickstarted by Jake Bates kicking the ball short of the new "landing zone," which set the Steelers up at the 40-yard line. Two plays after making the great pass, Cordarrelle Patterson put an exclamation point on the drive with a 31-yard touchdown run right up the middle. It was a nice drive overall, as the offense took what the Lions gave it, but it usually takes more than one good pass to know if a quarterback is ready or not.
AP Photo / Matt Freed
Steelers' Justin Fields avoids a pass rusher as he throws the football.
After being set up nicely by a fumble, Justin Fields completed a pair of passes, including a strike to MyCole Pruitt over the middle for 22 yards, which led to another touchdown. A big component of Steelers football in recent years has been being opportunistic, especially when the opponents make numerous mistakes. Wilson and Fields both took advantage of that in this game, which led to the early 14-0 lead.
Fields had one more nice completion after that, which was a 13-yard pass to Van Jefferson to begin a drive, but outside of that, his performance was not amazing. He had a miscommunication with Zach Frazier, which completely killed a possession, as well as a big sack that killed another one. While Wilson apparently just needed one pass to prove himself, Fields needed a lot more to present his case to be a starter, and a pair of big passes were not nearly enough.
In Tomlin's mind, some of the major questions have been answered. It is all but confirmed that Wilson will be the starter, and Fields will continue to work with the backups to develop. He will be ready to play in case something happens to Wilson. There are still plenty of questions to be answered about the team, but Tomlin will be happy to focus on those and put this "quarterback competition" to rest once and for all.
What do you think about Tomlin's reasoning for pulling his starting quarterback after just a single drive? Let us know in the comments.
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