It sounds like Russell Wilson will spend another week on the bench
Oct 1, 2024, 1:04 PM
Former Denver Broncos QB Russell Wilson might be on the bench again this week for the Pittsburgh Steelers.
Even if he’s starting to get healthier from a calf injury he suffered the night before training camp started.
Wilson has been the Steelers emergency third QB in each of the team’s four games. Technically, that makes him inactive, but he could’ve gotten in if starter Justin Fields and backup Kyle Allen both got hurt. Obviously, the odds of that happening were extremely long.
Still, it sounds like Wilson is getting closer to participating in practice and being an option for head coach Mike Tomlin. Though it doesn’t seem like the boss in Pittsburgh is going to make a change, even if Wilson is healthy.
Russell Wilson, if all goes well, likely ends this week as a full participant. And Justin Fields continues to start. https://t.co/cwdVUEmGiw
— Ian Rapoport (@RapSheet) October 1, 2024
Frankly, can you blame Tomlin? The Steelers are 3-1 with Fields as the starter, and changing quarterbacks on a winning team can send an odd message to the locker room.
“The guiding factor for us at this point is the amount of ball that we have in front of us, how early we are in this process. That’s probably been one of the significant variables in terms of our approach to his rehabilitation,” Tomlin told reporters on Tuesday.
Translation? Pittsburgh is leading the AFC North, so Tomlin is going to take his sweet time with Wilson, not forcing a move just for the sake of it.
It’s a curious position for Wilson to be in. He wasn’t good in his two seasons in Denver, and the Broncos took on the largest dead cap hit in NFL history to get him off the roster. Denver is paying Wilson $39 million to play for the Steelers this year. That’s how desperate Sean Payton was to move on.
But if Wilson is a healthy backup this week against the Cowboys and moving forward, it’s an ego hit for the nine-time Pro Bowler. There’s really no other way to slice it.
