by Bo Marchionte
@bomarchionte | College2Pro.com
Published August 22, 2026, 10:07 AM
The Morning After: Steelers Quarterback Duo
Youngstown, OH – Quarterbacks get to sleep after bad nights. The throws don’t.
They follow them home.
A week ago, Pittsburgh’s quarterback room made preseason football look almost suspiciously easy. Mason Rudolph, Will Howard and Drew Allar combined to complete 27 of 32 passes for 322 yards and two touchdowns. The ball came out on time. The chains moved. Everybody went home feeling a little better about the depth chart.
Friday night against the Jets was the bill arriving.
Pittsburgh lost 17-0, with Howard and Allar combining for 184 passing yards and no touchdowns. Howard threw both interceptions.
Allar spent much of the second half operating behind an offensive line that seemed determined to introduce him personally to every piece of grass at Acrisure Stadium.
Same quarterback room.
Entirely different examinations.
And Saturday morning, the film matters more than the scoreboard.
Because one quarterback left Friday with legitimate questions about whether Pittsburgh can trust him with a roster spot. The other probably woke up checking to make sure all his ribs were still where he left them.
WILL HOWARD – THE MISTAKES ARE GETTING EXPENSIVE
There is a dangerous little trick in Howard’s final stat line.
He completed 10 of 15 passes.
That looks fine.
Keep reading.
Seventy-four yards. Two interceptions. A 4.9-yard average per attempt.
That tells the story considerably better.
Howard eventually found some rhythm. He hit Roman Wilson for 14 yards and later drove a throw to Ben Skowronek for 16. There were moments when the football came out with conviction and Howard looked comfortable enough operating the offense.
The problem is Pittsburgh isn’t evaluating whether Howard can complete passes.
They’re evaluating whether they can trust him.
And Friday night he gave them reasons not to.
A ball intended for Germie Bernard was placed too far inside and deflected in traffic. Then Howard threw one directly to Jets safety Andre Cisco. His second interception came later and finished his evening.
Two turnovers. Two drives erased.
Howard understood exactly what happened.
“Those two turnovers really make it sour,” Howard said. “We were driving the ball, we were in the red zone the one time, kind of in the logo, gold zone the other one. We’re making progress, we’re getting the ball down there. We just got to be able to finish.”
That is the maddening part.
Howard wasn’t completely lost.
He said he felt comfortable in the pocket and believed he was working through his progressions well, particularly on early downs. There were stretches where you could see it. Then came the throws that changed the entire evaluation.
This isn’t college anymore, where a sixth-round quarterback can live indefinitely on traits, toughness and developmental promise.
Roster mathematics eventually become cruel.
Howard entered the summer needing to prove he deserved one of those 53 chairs.
Friday night, he made the argument harder.
Head coach Mike McCarthy wasn’t interested in burying him afterward. In fact, his evaluation went somewhere more interesting than the interceptions.
“I have no concern so far,” McCarthy said when asked about his young quarterbacks responding to adversity. “They’ve played at big schools. Both of those guys grew up playing quarterback. I don’t see any blink in their performance.”
No blink is important.
Wouldn’t you agree no mistakes are better.
McCarthy also noted that Howard had two similar mistakes the previous week and managed to play through them. That ability to recover is part of quarterbacking. So is making sure the same lesson doesn’t keep appearing on Monday’s film.
Howard can make throws. Nobody watching camp needed Friday night to establish that.
The question now is whether Pittsburgh trusts what happens between them.
DREW ALLAR – SOMEBODY BUY THE KID AN ICE PACK
Allar’s second NFL preseason appearance wasn’t quarterback development so much as occupational hazard.
He finished 11 of 22 for 110 yards. He was sacked three times. The Steelers’ protection routinely collapsed around him, and there were snaps when evaluating the quarterback required first determining whether he had been given enough time to actually play quarterback.
Yet something interesting happened inside the mess.
Allar kept looking downfield.
That matters.
Young quarterbacks under pressure often develop an understandable survival mechanism: eyes drop, feet accelerate, play over.
Allar repeatedly resisted it.
He moved within and outside the pocket while continuing to survey the field, looking for somewhere to put the football rather than simply somewhere to hide himself.
Then he gave Pittsburgh the throw of the night.
Allar stood in, waited and delivered a 38-yard strike to Lake McRee.
Not a frantic heave. Not backyard football.
A quarterback throw.
Ryan McCollum and Jack Driscoll greeted him afterward with high-fives, and it was easy to understand why. For one snap, amid a second half spent dodging bodies, Pittsburgh got a clean glimpse of why McCarthy invested a third-round pick in him.
Allar wasn’t particularly interested in accepting the protection as an excuse afterward.
“Obviously not good enough,” he said. “For me, I think it kind of started early. I just need to do a better job, especially early in drives, taking what’s given.”
That’s quarterback-school language.
Allar talked about passing up underneath opportunities that could have prevented Pittsburgh from getting behind the sticks.
Catch-and-tackle isn’t sexy. Second-and-6 beats second-and-13.
That recognition may be more valuable in August than another 38-yard completion.
McCarthy’s quarterback education isn’t built exclusively around throws, either. He talked afterward about listening to Howard and Allar communicate with quarterbacks coach Tom Arth between possessions.
“We go through every picture,” McCarthy said. “Everything is discussed. I can hear the conversations on the headsets. That’s what I’m listening to while the defense is out there.”
That’s the classroom.
Friday night was the lab.
McCarthy also acknowledged that additional work might have benefited Allar, mentioning healthier run-game circumstances and more first and second-down snaps against man coverage. Instead, Allar got a different lesson: compromised pockets, long-yardage situations and a night where very little came easily.
He still flashed.
His five-completion run late in the game showed what happened once he finally found some rhythm. There was velocity. There was confidence. There was also a dangerous throw mixed into the sequence, another reminder that development isn’t supposed to arrive polished.
Allar himself found positives.
“I felt really comfortable back there, especially on the move,” he said.
That showed.
THE MORNING AFTER
This is why preseason quarterback evaluations can’t live inside a box score.
Howard completed 67 percent of his passes and left you worried.
Allar completed 50 percent and gave you reasons to want another look.
One quarterback’s evening was damaged largely by his own decisions. The other’s was spent trying to function while the pocket repeatedly disappeared around him.
McCarthy called it “great teaching film.”
Of course he did. Coaches love teaching film the way Jimmy Hendrix played guitar.
Usually somebody else had to endure something unpleasant to produce it.
Now comes the part that matters.
Howard has to prove Friday was a bad night rather than another piece of evidence in a summer-long pattern. As a sixth-round pick fighting inside a crowded quarterback room, reputation provides him no shelter.
Allar has a different challenge.
He needs to turn the pocket feel, arm talent and flashes of processing into complete drives. Pretty throws are nice. Quarterbacks eventually have to finish possessions.
Friday night provided Pittsburgh no points.
Saturday morning provides something considerably more useful.
Questions.
What happens if in Buffalo for the final preseason game the fortune of each player is in changed?
Do they keep four quarterbacks?
I’m still sticking with that’s negative ghost rider.
McCarthy Is Leaving No Reps on the Table with Drew Allar
Mike McCarthy has spent decades building a reputation as a quarterback guru. So, when he does something unusual with a young quarterback, it’s probably worth remembering.
Especially now.
He wants to maximize the opportunities for his young quarterbacks, leaving no stone unturned.
With one preseason game left and the dreaded August 30 deadline to reduce rosters to 53 players, the hype train around Howard and Allar will only intensify.
One important takeaway from all of this:
On the first day of rookie minicamp, no other quarterbacks were on the field except Drew Allar.
There are usually a few arms throwing during this time. That wasn’t the case in Pittsburgh.
McCarthy wanted an abundance of work for the third-round pick out of Penn State in the 2026 NFL Draft.
I remain convinced that McCarthy keeps three quarterbacks: Aaron Rodgers, Mason Rudolph and Allar.
Moving forward, reps for Allar would only decrease with another young arm on the roster.
This isn’t to dismiss the character or achievements of Howard.
It’s just the business of the National Football League.
Photo Credit Frank Hyatt/College2Pro.com
