4 Surprises from Art Rooney II’s recent comments
Each week our SCU staff and contributors picks the “surprises” from the latest NFL headlines. Check out more below to see which news surprised us the most!
Pittsburgh Steelers President Art Rooney II recently sat down in a series of interviews over the last week, including a 1-on-1 with Missi Matthews on Steelers.com as well as other media appearances. Here are some takeaways from what the head of the organization was asked, and how he answered.
Mike Tomlin
Unfortunately for the “Fire Mike Tomlin” crowd, the Steelers are a staple of consistency in the NFL, and no such words were coming out of the Steelers’ President’s mouth. While he declined to comment on yet another extension for Coach Tomlin, Rooney was quoted as saying:
“I don’t really evaluate Mike on anything other than I’m glad he’s our coach.”
Among the paraphrased statements is that Rooney hopes Tomlin will be here for a “long time” and he’s pleased that the Steelers are always in a position to compete for a championship with Tomlin at the helm.
Matt Canada
Glossed over ever so slightly as the biggest hot button topic of this offseason, Rooney cited the team’s improvement since the bye week, as well as consistency with developing rookie QB Kenny Pickett, as points of concern to keeping Canada on board for at least one more season.
According to ESPN’s Jeremy Fowler, Matt Canada still has one more year remaining on his current coaching contract. For those unaware, the Steelers usually do not depart with a coach currently under contract and typically allow their deal to expire as a means to “part ways”.
This may come as news to fans who have had their pitchforks and torches out, going as far to use any local PA sports betting app for odds on the coordinator’s dismissal.
Whether Canada will be around long-term is yet to be seen, but not having a full offseason with Pickett as the starting quarterback, as well as changing his offensive coordinator and starting over from scratch, could prove detrimental to his development, per Rooney.
“Yeah, I think so,” Rooney said. “I think we’d like to see the improvement and you know, with a rookie quarterback, they seem to work well together. They built a good working relationship. And so to kind of sort of start over again with a new offensive coordinator, could wind up back in the same situation again, where the first half of the season you’re breaking into new coordinator, so, we just felt like there’s enough there to build on that, we want to continue to keep that group together.”
Hence, Canada is still around.
Kenny Pickett
Rooney was not surprised that Kenny Pickett became the starting quarterback, but he also wasn’t aware that it may happen in Week 4 against the New York Jets:
I expected him to become the starter at some point.
That expectation, however, wasn’t carried over to being the Week 1 starter nor the starter throughout training camp and the preseason. Rooney acknowledged the uphill climb of a rookie QB transitioning from college to the pros, and was confident in his assessment of having no regrets over Pickett playing ahead of Mitchell Trubisky to start the season.
Mitch Trubisky
Speaking of which, Rooney’s interview on Pittsburgh local KDKA-TV generated some buzz, when he mentioned that he’d like Mitch Trubisky to return next season:
“I expect Mitch will be on the roster next year and be an effective backup if we need him,” he said. “I think he showed that he can be that. We can win with him.”
The news comes as a surprise with the Steelers floating only a million dollars under the announced 2023 NFL salary cap, with Trubisky set to earn over $10 million. The team can save $8 million by cutting him this offseason, a move which could be paired with others to help get some cap relief.
It would come as a surprise if Trubisky is retained for this price tag, as several starters and backups around the league last season netted somewhere between $4-6 million, including players such as Jacoby Brissett and Teddy Bridgewater, who started several games for their respective franchises.
Coupled with Trubisky’s postseason pass aggressive comments alluding to regretting his decision to sign with the Steelers this offseason, it will be surprising to see if the former second-overall pick of the 2017 NFL Draft stays on with the team in 2023.
