Make the Most of Aaron Rodgers' Last Run in Pittsburgh
Earlier this month, Aaron Rodgers finally signed with the Steelers, ending an exhausting offseason saga that directly impacted their draft. The 41-year-old quarterback’s arrival marks the beginning of what promises to be the weirdest chapter in franchise history. Good.
Scouting reports paint a grim picture: diminished arm strength, slower processing speed, increasingly erratic decision-making in the pocket. This isn’t the MVP who torched the Steelers in Super Bowl XLV. It’s a guy who is lucky he’s still able to throw more touchdowns than interceptions. But given that the alternative was watching Justin Fields, Kenny Pickett, Russell Fields, or newly-resigned career backup Mason Rudolph captain another 9-8 or 10-7 season, I’ll take the chaos.
The Steelers roster, outside of future Hall of Famer T.J. Watt and Mr. Olympia-ready new wideout D.K. Metcalf, screams rebuilding year. So why not rebuild with a quarterback who once told Pat McAfee he could host Jeopardy! full-time while still playing football? “They film 46 days a year. I worked 187 this year in Green Bay. That gives me 178 days to do Jeopardy!” During his actual hosting stint, he wrote reminders on the podium including “Relax,” “Speak clearly,” and “Don’t pick your nose.”
This is who we’re dealing with. A man whose marriage status remains so murky that his own family questions whether he recently got married. A guy who spent his darkness retreat contemplating a vice-presidential run with RFK Jr. Someone whose allegedly tight bonds with male friends became internet fodder years ago, the sort of confirmed-bachelor gossip that used to follow Dallas Cowboys great Troy Aikman. The NFL’s Gatsby, throwing spirals while maintaining an impenetrable mystique.
Pittsburgh needs this untamable energy. After all, we remain a city on the downslope of history. Half our population vanished after steel collapsed. We’ve continued to experience natural population loss (more deaths than births) since the mid-1990s. The Pittsburgh Public Schools will soon be closing a dozen or so schools due to plummeting enrollment. Rising housing costs price out longtime residents while childless remote workers claim what’s left. Outgoing mayor Ed Gainey’s signature achievement? Distributing recycling bins.
The sports scene? The Pirates exist solely to cash revenue-sharing checks. The Penguins are finally admitting the Crosby/Malkin era is over. Pitt football died decades before it joined the ACC. The city that once collected championships like parking tickets now debates whether Mike Tomlin's string of 18 non-losing seasons constitutes success or stagnation.
Enter Rodgers, who’ll at least give Yinzers something to discuss besides potholes. Watch him clash with Tomlin, whose idea of flexibility is switching from telling reporters “The standard is the standard" to "It is what it is.” Watch him try to audible out of every play called by Arthur Smith, offensive coordinator and former UNC-Chapel Hill offensive lineman whose dismal Falcons head coaching tenure featured the kind of boring, run-heavy offense that makes watching grass grow seem thrilling. Beat writers already report Smith had to “dial back” that unexciting scheme for Russell Wilson and Justin Fields last year. Now imagine implementing his beloved outside zone with a 41-year-old quarterback who thinks every snap should end with a scramble in the pocket and a moon shot.
The delicious irony? Rodgers beat both Tomlin and legendary Steelers quarterback Ben Roethlisberger in their last Super Bowl appearance. Now he can be the guy who finally ends the Tomlin era if and when this experiment implodes. The Steelers spent months pretending their quarterback room was fine, let the draft (and intriguing second-generation prospect Shadeur Sanders) pass without addressing it, then panic-signed a guy who spent the entire offseason telling them he wasn’t sure if retirement beat coming to what used to be called Heinz Field. It does, but it’s too late now.
Best case: Rodgers summons enough magic for a brief playoff run while mentoring next year's draft pick. Worst case: he flames out spectacularly, takes Tomlin with him, and forces the organization into the full rebuild it's been avoiding for years. Either one beats watching Ohio State rookie signal-caller Will Howard check down on third-and-long while Smith calls another draw play for fellow rookie Kaleb Johnson.
Our city's relationship with decline is complicated: as John Hoerr ably documents in And the Wolf Family Came, we spent half a century losing our entire industrial base while clinging to those moments of sporting success and eds-and-meds employment scraps that delusional boosters passed off as a renaissance. Now we’re getting a quarterback whose best days are behind him, whose public persona oscillates between genius and lunatic, whose commitment to anything beyond his own incredible mythology remains questionable.
Perfect fit, really.
Welcome to Pittsburgh, Aaron. Bring your mood crystals, your ayahuasca, your vaccine takes, your darkness retreats, and all your other headline-hogging controversies. In a city where early-2000s “most livable” wins became 2000-and-late punchlines and our biggest recent infrastructure project involved fixing the bridge that collapsed during Biden’s visit, you'll fit right in. We're not winning a Super Bowl with you. We weren't winning one without you. But at least now we'll have someone interesting to watch.
