On the first day of free agency last season, the Pittsburgh Steelers signed free agent quarterback Mitch Trubisky. The move was aggressive by Steelers standards, but the team knew it had to move quickly to find a player to fill the void left by the retirement of Ben Roethlisberger.
The season didn’t go according to plan for Trubisky, as the team immediately drafted Kenny Pickett in the first round of the 2022 NFL Draft and benched Trubisky in favor of him a month later.
Trubisky has already expressed his regrets about signing so quickly, and the vibe he’s giving off is that he wants to be on a team where he can start, and the Steelers aren’t it. But that may not happen in 2023, according to Steelers owner Art Rooney II.
When Rooney spoke to the media this week, he assured everyone but the fans that Trubisky would be back as Pickett’s backup. Trubisky has an $11 million cap hit for next season, so it seems unreasonable to pay him that amount, but we can’t confuse that with what was then a fair free agent contract.
Consistency is so important when measuring team success. This team is better off with Trubisky as a backup because he knows the system better than anyone the front office can bring. But is the experience worth $11 million? Perhaps not. But there is room for Pittsburgh and Trubisky around a contract extension to lower that 2023 cap and maintain that chemistry on the depth chart.
Let us know in the comments if you think the Steelers should keep Trubisky and under what circumstances.
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This story originally appeared on Steelers Wire
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