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Through two weeks of the preseason, the battle for the starting quarterback position for the Pittsburgh Steelers is still uncertain. Justin Fields has played in both preseason games, and he's made some good plays, as well as some that he can work on. Nonetheless, Fields himself thinks that he's shown enough to make a case for being the starting quarterback over Russell Wilson.
“I think I've shown what I can do,” Fields said. “I think the time that I did have with the [first team] practicing in training camp, I think that went well. I think we grew a lot each and every day, but at the end of the day, it's not up to me.”
Wilson had been dealing with an injury for most of training camp, which gave Fields the opportunity to play with the first team, and he impressed.
“I mean, I'm just going to come in here every day, each and every day, the same person, being a leader for this team and work my butt off, and everything else will be handled,” Fields said.
The Steelers quarterback battle is going down to the wire
Pittsburgh Steelers head coach Mike Tomlin has a tough decision on his hands as the third preseason game approaches. This will be the last time that Russell Wilson and Justin Fields get to show who deserves to be the starting quarterback, and Tomlin already knows what he wants to see from Fields.
“I want to see him show some of the things that we've seen out here in the practice setting,” Tomlin said. “Much like I've talked about the offensive unit. We've had some really good days and shown a really high floor with the potential for splash plays, and so I want to see it in the stadium.”
Neither Wilson nor Fields had promising days in their preseason game against the Buffalo Bills, but Tomlin says that the opposite has happened in practice. All Tomlin wants to see is the practices translating to the field against opposing teams.
“I'm in the mindset that it's a dry rehearsal, man. I want to see the fruit of the labor that I've seen out here on the practice field,” Tomlin said. “We've had some really awesome practice days and shown really good consistency and fundamentals and splash-play ability, but I haven't seen it in stadium yet. In a perfect world, I'd like to see that in the stadium before I move on to provide reps for some other guys that are trying to get a job for themselves.”
Wilson might be the favorite to take the starting spot, but Fields may have the skillset needed to perfect the offense that Arthur Smith wants to run.
