'Aaron Rodgers Watch' looms over team as Steelers open OTAs

By all indications and like most of his Pittsburgh Steelers teammates, Patrick Queen likes Mason Rudolph.

Surely, Queen likewise respects Skylar Thompson and rookie Will Howard. Queen believes the Steelers can win with Rudolph (or one of the others) as the team’s starting quarterback, too.

But as a 25-year-old lifelong football fan, there might only be one player left in the NFL who’s been in the league for as long as Queen can remember. And that someone — Aaron Rodgers — is presumed to probably/eventually/maybe/likely soon joining the Steelers.

“I’m fine with the guys we’ve got right now,” Queen, the veteran linebacker, said of the Steelers quarterbacks corps. “I’ll roll out there with them.

“The little fan in me when I was little was a fan of Aaron Rodgers. It would be dope to have him on the team. But the two guys we’ve got — three guys — I’ll roll with them any day.”

On the first day of organized team activities Tuesday, the Steelers indeed rolled with the threesome of Rudolph, Thompson and Howard at quarterback.

The organization long has carried four quarterbacks throughout the summer and preseason. The obvious implication is they are holding a spot for Rodgers, the four-time NFL MVP who has been linked to the Steelers since early spring.

On the first day the 2025 Steelers went through a practice-like session en masse, the elephant in the UPMC Rooney Sports Complex was that Rodgers wasn’t there and had not yet signed with them.

“We’ll see what happens,” longtime team co-captain Cameron Heyward said. “You really just can’t worry about what’s going on outside of here. That’s the way the Steelers have always run the ship.

“You can speculate and think one of two ways, but I think at this time and at this moment of the offseason, just let me lock in on my craft right now. Let me make sure I lock in on my job. If you start playing that hoping and wishing game, I will see you down at the cathedral at the end of the street.”

After 19 NFL seasons, a Super Bowl MVP award and more passing yards than all but six players in NFL history (62,952), Rodgers has probably earned the right to sit out voluntary spring and summer sessions. But Rodgers is not signed or under contract, anyway, and as such he couldn’t technically be there regardless.

Steelers brass has largely played coy publicly about “Rodgers Watch,” with president Art Rooney II saying the team was willing to wait “a little while longer” for the 41-year-old to make his decision. Coach Mike Tomlin — initially, at least — gave the most concrete allusion to anything remotely resembling a deadline by pointing to the start of training camp in late July.

With Rodgers’ status dominating much of the conversation, his prospective teammates are professing they are content willing to wait.

“I just take it day by day. It is what it is,” tight end Pat Freiermuth said. “Just trying to put my head down and be a leader for this offense.

“There’s a lot of other things I can be doing rather than worrying about who’s going to be our quarterback.”

An inherent awkwardness in regard to the Rodgers circus can enter the discussion at times. Consider when, just moments before declaring he is not worrying about when the prospective starting quarterback might show up, Freiermuth gushed about the importance of OTAs.

“It’s very important to be here,” Freiermuth said, “and work with the guys, get familiar with them and get on the same page.”

That is particularly so when it involves the player at the most important position in the sport and in conjunction with his prospective pass catchers.

For now, though, the Steelers declare a willingness to wait it out. Rodgers has publicly cited personal issues in part for the delay in his decision, and rest assured no one who might soon be sharing a huddle with the future Hall of Famer is in much of a position to call him out for not being present for the first OTA.

“I play receiver,” Roman Wilson said. “Obviously it matters who throws me the ball, but at the end of the day all I’m really focused on is playing receiver and getting open and running routes for whoever is throwing me the ball.”