The Steelers’ backup quarterback competition behind Aaron Rodgers has a clear leader through the first stretch of training camp, and it’s the veteran, not the developmental prospect Pittsburgh spent draft capital on.
NBC Sports analyst Chris Simms said this week that Mason Rudolph has separated himself from Will Howard in practice. “What it sounds like to me is that Mason Rudolph has done really well in practice, and Will Howard hasn’t done quite well enough,” Simms said,
That’s notable because Howard entered camp with the buzz. He’s the younger arm, the one fans wanted to see push for the job. But early practice reps are going the other way. Rudolph is operating with the kind of comfort you’d expect from a quarterback who’s started NFL games before — quick reads, on-time throws, command of the huddle. Howard is doing what a lot of first- or second-year quarterbacks do against a real NFL scheme: hesitating, missing throws he’d have made in college, and generally playing like the game is moving faster than he is. According to ClutchPoints’ camp reporting, those struggles have carried over from practice into live game reps.
None of this means Howard is a bust or that the competition is decided. Camp battles shift, and it’s still early. But if Pittsburgh had to activate a backup plan tomorrow, the practice tape says Rudolph is the answer right now — not the exciting developmental swing, but the guy who already knows how to run the offense without turning the ball over. That’s the trade-off with a rookie-scheme learning curve: it favors experience until it doesn’t.
