Steelers and Sam Darnold

I think its a "fumbles" vs. "fumbles lost" thing... Plus the QB is credited with fumbles for snap exchanges. We had something like that last year when we were talking about Fields. People kept saying "oh, well he fumbled 5 times"... like no, he lost one fumble and Zach Frazier dirted two snaps and snapped a shotgun snap too early when the QB wasn't looking for the ball.

 

What are you going to do when you can't blame everything on Tomlin anymore?

 

Without going through 5 pages, is the argument in this thread that if the Steelers would have signed the 2026 SB winning QB then they would also have been SB contenders? If so, that's the dumbest possible takeaway from the Seahawks win.

How about this...The Seahawks just rejected the narrative that this is a Franchise QB and offense driven league and there are only two types of teams - those with franchise QBs who can compete for the SB, and those still looking. Both teams were defense dominant. Darnold has shown that a QB can be the product of his team - a bust on an awful Jets team, a solid QB on a good Minny team, and a SB winner on a very good team.

 

This. Seattle system had Geno Smith looking pretty good. I don’t think Sam could have done much better than what Aaron did against Houston. There were no receivers that were open, running game was ****. Offense would be designed to minimize using middle of field. Those outs to Gainwell would result in loss of yards. Darnhold’s deep ball isn’t special. It was Seattle’s defense that gave him multiple possessions with good field position. They had a decent running game. Good play design etc. Bottom line… Ben couldn’t win with Tomlin in last decade. I doubt Darnold would do better.

 

I thought he could have been a Ben when he came out of USC. Admittedly I didn't see any of his games last year but I wasn't impressed with him yesterday. It reminded me of Ben in our first Super Bowl which he played basically like crap but Darnold isn't a 2nd year player. Yesterday showed me I think we made the right choice to seek a qb elsewhere.

 

Now we have MR and a 6th round pic that has yet to play a down in the NFL and possibly an even older AR returning to round out the Qb room. Clearly question marks for the Qb position with an owner itching to “be in contention”

if we had signed Darnold were probably coming off a playoff run, (have a better chance of getting past the first round), have a solid starter in Darnold, MR and Howard with a chance to really fill the holes on defense and WR. And can wait patiently for the right draftee to draft or trade up for to become our next franchise Qb, while were a viable playoff team.

i know why we went after AR, it was just a cheap short term hail mary last chance playoff run for MT. But now i think we may have to suffer a rough season or two before we can start to get better

 

He played great. I don't have angst at giving Rogers a shot though.

 

It's all a matter of opinion of course, but put ANY receiver you choose on this team, and I believe they are still one and done in the playoffs.

 

I think they also showed the importance of drafting well (something we've not been good at recently).

They have a significant amount of good players on rookie deals.

We may have drafted better in the last two years or so, but the end of Colbert's term really set this team back. I think because we focused hard on trying to hold on to the idea that we could still be competitive at the end of Ben's career instead of embracing a rebuild. And we're still in that mode...which I think is only extending the purgatory we're currently in.

 

I think Steelers need another legit wide receiver and help on the OL than bring in slim picking at Qb free agency. People keep talking about Willis, but he was trash at Tennessee. Rudolph beat him easily for #2 job in Tennessee and it was not close. He had 1.5 good games in 2025 .Heck, Rudolph, Duck, Dobbs have all had a good game. Willis is 6 ft tall and that is short for a qb. He runs around a bit because he cannot see over OL. As a result timing of plays isn’t there. You can never be consistently accurate if you are moving and throwing to a moving target. The degree of difficulty rises exponentially based on pure physics. You have a shorter and slower Kordell with Willis. Pass.

 

You are going to have to wait until someone gives him iPad time so he can respond

 

My guess is that Omar will become the focus. But we'll see.

 

The Tomlin era is over and it cost us big time. No playoff wins in the last nine years and underachieving relative to the lack of talent we have. He exited on his own accord under contact from the Steelers under the cover of darkness without a media press conference.

I can see a few fans treating my posts like a pair of dress shoes two sizes too small. There is no need to pivot as I think we are 2 key players away from making the superbowl! Darnold would reduce that number the 1. But the lack of action by the Steelers cost us big time in the free agency QB position is our #1 need. That was the point of this thread. Darnold would likey QB the Steelers to 1 better win duing the season, maybe 2 more wins. I match his resutls in the past two seasons vs 90 % of the starting Qb's. The man was 3-0 in the playoffs, threw for 5 TD's and 0 Interceptions vs. good defenses.

Every super winner has at least a good Head coach, a good GM and a good QB. Top 12 guys I say.

 

Phiily.

No, I would not. He last two years proves it.

 

Just ignore the fact that Darnold said he went to Seattle because he wanted to play in Kubiak's offense, both of them worked together with the 49ers stop acting like the Steelers blew it he didn't have much interest in them.

 

If we make the SB in your scenario, I await all of your posts pointing out how we did it with Tomlin's players!

IMO, Tomlin leaves the team with mostly empty cupboards. Part of that is the poor drafting we've had recently (where Tomlin is one of the two or three main decision makers...especially post Colbert). And part of that is the organizational philosophy that says "no rebuilding ever".

So team employees (GM, HC) build teams to maximize current regular season wins at the expense of medium-term development.

That made sense when Ben was on the roster IMO. But it's time for Art to turn the page and let the team rebuild. Probably it's been time for a while. But I think the MM hire (and Rooney's own comments) suggest that he's hell-bent against it.

 

The Pittsburgh Steelers, in their search for a long-term quarterback during the 2025 offseason, considered
Sam Darnold but lost out when he signed a three-year, $110.5 million deal with the Seattle Seahawks. Reports suggest Pittsburgh was hesitant to guarantee him the franchise QB role, unlike Seattle, which offered him a clearer starting path.

We missed. Seattle and thier Head coach and GM, did not

Now if you want to agure that, there is plenty of space in this forum to do so.

 

Sure, they probably checked in on him it was still his choice of playing in a Arthur Smith offense or Kubiak's who he was familiar with .

 

Mike Tomlin didn't believe in the 'franchise QB' label so there is that....

"You know, I don't know what you guys mean by franchise quarterback. Is he our QB1? Yes. But there's a lot of silly responsibility that comes with that term," Tomlin said when asked about whether he considered Pickett the "franchise quarterback." "Everybody thinks they've got one, but not everybody has one and all of that. He's our starting quarterback. I'm not going to saddle him with that cliche that's overused in our game, in our business too much these days."

 

It is not as simple as looking at what he has done and saying we screwed up by not getting him. I am not sure that we could have afforded him at the time. With our defense sucking up historic amounts of money, there was just not a lot left to pay a big QB. That was a lot of why we got Fields and Wilson. They were cheap.

I also think that any QB, no matter how good they are/were could have succeeded in the situation the Steelers have had the last several years. Bad run game. Bad O line. Weak at WR. We have not been set up to support a QB that throws the ball.

We are also a run first, pass second team under Tomlin. The Steelers way has been to keep it close and kick a Boswell FG in the final seconds to win by 2. If Darnold was here, he would not have seen the success he has had with Seattle.

At the end of the day, I think we have been way too focused on our defense at the expense of the offense. I don't like it, but I would hate it even more if we had had a truly good potential QB and squandered that opportunity because we did not give that QB the tools they needed to succeed. We had Fields and Wilson. You know the places they have been. Both don't have what it takes to be a good starter at this point in their lives. Fields may have never had it, and Wilson is long past his prime. So at least we did not waste a chance by having a good QB and watching him fail in our system.

McCarthy is not what I hoped for in our next HC, but he will undoubtedly bring a much different game to the Steelers and I hope it is an improvement. It can't be much worse to be honest. He also has a lot to prove after his time in Dallas. If he goes on to crush it, then McCarthy is vindicated and Jerry Jones looks dumber.

 

And Darnold would've been playing with a lesser WR1 in Pittsburgh and an older defense, still no Super Bowl with the Steelers.