Tag: Justin Fields

Steelers planning to pass on fifth-year option for QB Justin Fields

Justin Fields is not expected to get his fifth-year option with Pittsburgh.

According to ESPN’s Adam Schefter, the Pittsburgh Steelers are not expected to pick up the fifth-year option on newly-acquired quarterback Justin Fields. If the Steelers did this, they would be on the hook for more than $25 million in 2025 just to pay Fields.

Trading for Fields was the second most exciting quarterback addition of the Steelers offseason. After completely gutting the quarterback depth chart, the Steelers went out and signed veteran Russell Wilson to be the starter and then pulled off the trade with the Chicago Bears to land Fields.

This news means all three of the Steelers current quarterbacks are playing out the final years of their contracts in 2024. Some have said this is a prove-it year for Fields but short of a catastrophic injury to Wilson, Fields isn’t likely to see the field. This muddies up his value and future with the team.

Pittsburgh also has until the May 2 deadline to decide about the fifth-year option for starting running back Najee Harris.

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2024 NFL draft: Steelers open to taking a quarterback

WIth three rental quarterbacks on the roster, the team could draft a new signal caller this year.

In our latest Pittsburgh Steelers mock draft, we speculated that the Steelers could trade newly-acquired quarterback Justin Fields in a draft-day deal with the Denver Broncos to help build this team up at other spots.

For some, this might seem far-fetched but after listening to general manager Omar Khan speak to the media on Monday, this might not be such a stretch after all.

Khan was honest about the potential future of Fields with the team and that the team is open to the idea of drafting a quarterback in the 2024 NFL draft.

“There’s some good players there, and I wouldn’t close the door on anything,” Khan said. “There’s an opportunity to improve that room. Obviously, we’ll look at it. We have three guys that are on one-year deals and we have to be open to it.”

The Steelers are unlikely to give Fields his fifth-year option, especially given they also need to decide on running back Najee Harris as well as the fact that Russell Wilson is the starting quarterback this season.

We are all for the Steelers adding a quarterback in the second or third round this year even if they don’t trade away Fields. Poor planning by the Steelers toward the end of Ben Roethlisberger’s career has been haunting them so we are glad to hear them thinking more proactively.

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Caleb Williams revealed his immediate reactions to the Bears trading Justin Fields

Caleb Williams sounds like someone who knew exactly what the Bears trading Justin Fields meant for his career.

It’s a foregone conclusion at this point that former USC quarterback Caleb Williams will go first overall to the Chicago Bears in Thursday’s first round of the 2024 NFL Draft.

The Bears trading former first-round quarterback Justin Fields to the Pittsburgh Steelers last month essentially sealed the deal for the pick, which will set up Chicago for a new era at the game’s most important position.

While appearing on the sports talk show The Pivot, Williams talked about where he was and how he reacted to the news that Fields was headed elsewhere.

He doesn’t come out explicitly and say that he knew then and there that the Bears were going to take him, but you can tell he understood the gravity of the moment for his future NFL career.

Let’s be honest. As effectively vague as his answer was, Williams sounds like someone who had a pretty good idea of what Fields being traded was going to mean later in the spring.

Bears fans will have a new quarterback in a month’s time, and Williams will be the next promising prospect that tries to finally solve Chicago’s long-standing issue behind center.

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Caleb Williams shares initial reaction to the Bears trading Justin Fields

The Bears trading Justin Fields signified that Caleb Williams was likely coming to Chicago. Here’s how he reacted when the trade went down.

It’s been over a month since the Chicago Bears moved on from quarterback Justin Fields and sent him to the Pittsburgh Steelers for a conditional 2025 sixth-round draft pick. The trade cleared a major hurdle in the team’s pursuit of a quarterback at No. 1 overall in the 2024 NFL Draft, which is widely expected to be USC’s Caleb Williams.

The 2022 Heisman Trophy winner has been projected to be the top overall pick for quite some time, and it felt inevitable that he would wind up with the Bears once they secured the No. 1 pick by way of the Carolina Panthers. But there was still conversation and debate that took place regarding Fields and whether or not Chicago would benefit from sticking with him instead and moving down the draft to accumulate picks. Once Fields was dealt, it made the Bears’ intentions that much clearer to everyone—including Williams.

Speaking with the Pivot Podcast, Williams was asked what his first thought was when he learned Fields had been traded. “My phone explodes,” Williams said. “I ended up calling a couple people and was just like, ‘well, we know where their mind and heart is at this instance.’ Let’s prepare and get ready and handle things accordingly and still do our due diligence on the situation.”

Williams immediately realized what that move meant, though. “In that moment, it was kind of like ‘wow’ because I didn’t do my top-30 visit yet; they didn’t have my medicals and things like that. They have it all now; it was nothing. And I had a good time on my top 30, but it was interesting right in that moment because it was so unexpected in that instance.”

Up to that point, Williams had only met formally with the Bears at the NFL Combine. His pro day had yet to happen, and his top-30 visit wasn’t scheduled until April. It sounds like Williams had a good idea he was the Bears’ target but didn’t expect them to make their intentions fully known without going through the other meetings yet.

Since then, there has been plenty of communication between Williams and the Bears, and reports indicate both sides are pleased with one another. It would be the upset of the century to not see him holding up a Bears jersey with NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell. After moving on from their old quarterback in March, the Bears are just days away from welcoming their new one in April.

Don’t judge Arthur Smith’s time with Desmond Ridder when it comes to Justin Fields

Steelers QB Justin Fields will be just fine working in coordinator Arthur Smith’s offense.

As the old saying goes, coaches coach and players play. It’s up to the players to execute what they’ve learned and Desmond Ridder didn’t.

During Ridder’s two seasons (19 games) with then-Atlanta Falcons head coach Arthur Smith, his numbers were less than desirable. Ridder put up 3,544 yards with a 14:12 touchdown-to-interception ratio.

Pittsburgh Steelers fans look at Ridder and wonder how Justin Fields will succeed under Smith. Only it’s not as cut and dry as that. Fields is a more superior athlete and all-around player than Ridder.

“Justin has a much stronger arm, and he’s definitively more accurate with his deep ball,” a former NFL executive and senior scout told Steelers Wire. “Justin’s a much more powerful and faster athlete, and Desmond is a very good athlete.”

When Fields gets the opportunity to take the, ahem, field, he’ll be running the system that Ridder did in Atlanta. “The mechanics of running any type of run design plays, Justin would be more successful because he has the tools to be more successful. Any of the deep, big ball plays, Justin’s going to be more accurate and it’s going to get there quicker and more on time because of the differences in the arm.”

So much of Smith’s offense is centered around plays with multiple formations and play action that produces wide-open targets. “Justin’s ability to hit that wide-open deep target is at a much higher level than Desmond’s,” he said.

Smith is well-versed in play-action, plays that Fields had success with in Chicago.

“His most successful plays were most often off of play action, deep sideline balls,” the source explained. “Some of it was dropback, and when he was on time and had those single high reads, he was really successful with it.”

“Coach Smith, when you look at last year, Desmond played best when he kept the ball between the hashes. Desmond’s better than Justin at throwing the ball inside the numbers in that open level between the linebackers and safeties. Whereas Justin’s much better from the hashes out and particularly from the numbers out to the sideline. There’s a distinct difference in Justin being better than Desmond that way.”

Smith will identify the differences between Fields and Ridder and coach to Fields’ strengths. “You will probably see more sideline deep balls than he threw or had the quarterback throw in Atlanta because of the differences in the quarterbacks,” he said. “That’s where he’ll adjust to Justin’s biggest issue in the middle of the field; confidence layering the ball over. That’s where you see him pull the ball back, pull it down quite a bit and have hesitation.”

Fields is more than coachable; he just needs to work on his confidence.

“It’ll come together for him, but he has to have the confidence that it won’t turn into a bad thing.”

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Grade the Steelers 2024 offseason ahead of the 2024 NFL draft

Cast your vote and tell us how you thnk the Steelers have done so far this offseason.

2024 has been one of the busiest and most interesting offseasons in the history of the Pittsburgh Steelers. General Manager Omar Khan continues to be aggressive, wheeling and dealing to rebuild several positional units. The highlights have centered on the team going from Kenny Pickett, Mason Rudolph and Mitch Trubisky to Russell Wilson, Justin Fields and Kyle Allen as the new quarterback depth chart.

Having said all that, Pittsburgh is 10 days away from the 2024 NFL draft with several starting spots unsettled. The team currently needs a starting center and wide receiver as well as an upgrade at offensive tackle and possibly cornerback.

It is hard to imagine the draft is going to yield every position the Steelers need and there will need to be more work done heading into offseason workouts and training camp.

But as of now, what grade do you give Khan and the Steelers front office for everything they have done prior to the draft?

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Steelers HC Mike Tomlin: Justin Fields’ past ‘not my business’

For Mike Tomlin, it’s about what Justin Fields can do for the Steelers and not what he did (or didn’t) do for the Bears. 

A new era is upon us with the offseason additions of Russell Wilson and Justin Fields. Gone are two quarterbacks who wound up being experiments and another who the Pittsburgh Steelers didn’t entrust to hand the keys to the car.

Fields’ previous team didn’t trust him, either, as evidenced by the Chicago Bears’ surrendering for a can of I.C. Lite.

But for Mike Tomlin, the reasons why Chicago didn’t want their former first-round draft pick around anymore doesn’t matter; it’s water under the bridge.

“I’m not judging anything that was done in Chicago,” Tomlin said at the NFL annual league meeting last month. “That’s not my business. I just look at the pedigree and the talent, the things that are not relative to coaching.”

For Tomlin, it’s about what he can do for the Pittsburgh Steelers and not what he did (or didn’t) do for the Chicago Bears.

Armed with a fresh start, Fields has an opportunity to redeem himself. Was it Fields, the Bears or a combination of the two? That’s in the rearview, and the young quarterback can forge a new path, especially if he remains in the Black and Gold beyond the 2024 season.

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How much better off are the Steelers with QBs Russell Wilson, Justin Fields?

The Steelers 2024 season will look vastly different than it has in years past.

This coming season will look vastly different for the Pittsburgh Steelers — even more so than it did the season after Ben Roethlisberger retired.

After firing Matt Canada and replacing him with Arthur Smith, Pittsburgh completely dismantled its quarterback room this offseason. Everyone was out: First, Mitch Trubisky, then Mason Rudolph and Kenny Pickett. They were replaced by two guys on opposite ends of the spectrum in nine-time Pro Bowler and Super Bowl champion Russell Wilson and work-in-progress Justin Fields.

Will the Steelers be better off from a record standpoint merely because they upgraded at the quarterback position?

The Athletic’s Mark Kaboly doesn’t believe it’s as simple as that.

“Some look at the 10 wins last year and just automatically say it can be 12 in 2024,” Kaboly wrote in a recent mailbag. “But what about the games they won that they easily could have lost? Cleveland, Baltimore, Green Bay and Tennessee are four games off the top of my head that the Steelers easily could have lost.”

Except for the Week 16 win over the Cincinnati Bengals, each of Pittsburgh’s 10 wins was by a touchdown or less.

Of course, as key as quarterback play is, football is a team sport, and any number of aspects can determine the outcome.

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Why the Bears will never regret trading Justin Fields

The Bears traded Justin Fields to the Steelers this offseason. Here’s why they’ll never regret the decision.

The Chicago Bears traded Justin Fields to the Pittsburgh Steelers earlier this offseason, where he’ll compete for the starting job with Russell Wilson.

The move, which was expected all offseason, was made in preparation for the arrival of Caleb Williams, who will be the first overall pick in the 2024 NFL draft. Fields failed to live up to the hype, and general manager Ryan Poles opted to move on (and reset the rookie quarterback contract) with Williams.

No matter what happens, the Bears aren’t going to regret trading Fields. The hope is that Williams will be a star in the NFL, as he was in college, but they won’t regret moving Fields even if Williams doesn’t turn out to be good. If Fields turns out to be a good player in Pittsburgh, it will be because they know what they are doing.

The Bears have never developed a quarterback, and Fields wasn’t given a fair shot at becoming a star. He’s a very athletic player who has talent, but the Chicago wasn’t able to unlock it, and they were never going to be able to. Poles had other ideas when he was hired, and Fields had to be great to change his mind. He wasn’t.

It was the right decision to move on from Fields, as the Bears needed to start over. All eyes will be on him when he gets his opportunity in Pittsburgh, but Chicago will have already moved on. This franchise should have higher hopes than what they’ve been given in recent years.

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Steelers WR George Pickens ready for a jersey number change

George Pickens wants that No. 1 jersey.

Tis the season for jersey number changes. Earlier in the week, the Pittsburgh Steelers announced the jersey numbers for all of the new additions including quarterbacks Russell Wilson and Justin Fields. We’ve already talked about former Steeler Antonio Brown having concerns with new Pittsburgh wide receiver Cordarrelle Patterson taking his old number.

Meanwhile, Steelers wide receiver George Pickens is shooting his shot and trying to get Pittsburgh to change his jersey number to No. 1. So Pickens took to Instagram to plead his case to his team.

Pickens wore No. 1 during his college career at the University of Georgia. The Steelers brought in Fields in a trade with the Chicago Bears where he wore the number but the Steelers switched it up to No. 2. This tells us the Steelers aren’t giving any player No. 1 so Pickens is going to be out of luck.

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