Dwayne Haskins aiming for No. 2 QB job in 2021, to be ‘future franchise QB’ thereafter
Less than eight months after being released by Washington, 6 ½ months after signing with the Pittsburgh Steelers and two weeks into his first training camp with them, Dwayne Haskins is setting the bar high.
Haskins was polite and understated during his first media session of camp Tuesday, but he wasn’t shy about making it clear that he sees himself as a major candidate to be the eventual successor to likely future Hall of Fame quarterback Ben Roethlisberger.
First, of course, the 24-year-old has to make the team. His first game action to that end comes Thursday in the Hall of Fame Game preseason opener in Canton, Ohio.
Barring something unforeseen or an off-the-field slip-up, Haskins’ performance in camp far has outpaced Josh Dobbs and leaves it seemingly assured Haskins is no worse than the Steelers’ No. 3 quarterback. The next step would be unseating veteran Mason Rudolph as the 39-year-old Roethlisberger’s primary backup.
Haskins was asked Tuesday if he sees it as an open competition for the QB2 spot.
“I’m trying to make it one,” he said.
Taking that a step further, is Thursday’s game against the Dallas Cowboys his first official tryout to be the Steelers’ future franchise quarterback?
“I feel like that was (the case) the first day I got here,” Haskins said. “I’ve been told certain things, and that’s between me and the coaches. But I’ve just got to go out there an prove I can play.”
Coach Mike Tomlin said Tuesday that Rudolph would start Thursday’s game, and Haskins would enter at some point before the end of the first half. Dobbs will finish the game, Tomlin said. Roethlisberger will not play.
After finishing third in the 2018 Heisman Trophy balloting and leading Ohio State to a Rose Bowl win, Haskins was the No. 15 overall pick of the 2019 draft. But he went 3-10 as a starter and had a subpar 74.4 passer rating over 16 games in two seasons with Washington before being released after a tumultuous month in which he was stripped of his captaincy following an incident in which he attended a party in breach of NFL covid protocol and later was benched.
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Chris Adamski is a TribLive reporter who has covered primarily the Pittsburgh Steelers since 2014 following two seasons on the Penn State football beat. A Western Pennsylvania native, he joined the Trib in 2012 after spending a decade covering Pittsburgh sports for other outlets. He can be reached at cadamski@triblive.com.
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