The quarterback state of affairs has been the most popular subject concerning the Pittsburgh Steelers for fairly a while now. Russell Wilson was initially named the starter to start the season, however with a lingering calf damage inflicting him to remain on the sideline in Week 1, Justin Fields obtained his probability to steer the offense.
Fields did a strong job. Pittsburgh by no means discovered the top zone towards the Atlanta Falcons, however they performed mistake-free soccer for essentially the most half and kicked six area objectives on their approach to an 18-10 win. Fields accomplished 17 of his 23 makes an attempt, throwing for 156 yards with a strong 91.9 passer ranking. He relied on his legs so much, together with his 14 speeding makes an attempt being essentially the most of any Steelers quarterback within the trendy period.
A fast look at a stat line like that makes it appear like a really conservative efficiency, which it was. Nonetheless, based on Chris Canty on ESPN’s Unsportsmanlike, that might be a results of Fields making an attempt to eliminate some unhealthy habits.
“Now he’s in Pittsburgh, there’s a course of with him making an attempt to unlearn plenty of the ‘unhealthy’ that he skilled with the Chicago Bears,” Canty mentioned. “So, Mike Tomlin is making an attempt to do two issues, he’s making an attempt to instill confidence in him, whereas additionally breaking down these unhealthy habits he was in a position to develop.”
Fields was drafted by the Chicago Bears, and his time there was sophisticated, to say the least. He was there for 3 years and had two head coaches in addition to two offensive coordinators throughout that point.
In His rookie yr, Matt Nagy was the pinnacle coach and Invoice Lazor was the offensive coordinator, however they had been fired after Fields’ rookie season. Throughout his second and third seasons, he handled Matt Eberflus as head coach and Luke Getsy as his offensive coordinator.
We’ll need to see how Fields continues to develop with the Steelers, but it surely’s truthful to say he didn’t take care of essentially the most secure teaching workers in Chicago. He additionally didn’t have many weapons round him, particularly in comparison with how the Bears have equipped their new quarterback, Caleb Williams.
As Canty alludes to, Tomlin has a troublesome process right here. Fields realized plenty of unhealthy habits throughout his time in Chicago, so Tomlin, and offensive coordinator Arthur Smith, try to educate these out of him. The one approach to try this can be to take care of the errors that include it, however these errors can damage his confidence, which Pittsburgh is trying to boost concurrently. It’s a troublesome state of affairs.
Week 1 was begin. Fields went up towards a strong protection, didn’t make any essential errors, and made some huge throws when he wanted to. If he needs to earn the full-time beginning function, he’ll need to take extra dangers than he did on Sunday, although.
Nonetheless, it was an encouraging Steelers debut for Fields. If he performs effectively together with his alternatives to start out in Weeks 2 and three, we’d see him run away with the beginning function.