Here we sit almost a full week into free agency after a blazing start when the team added DK Metcalf, and yet the Steelers still don’t have a starting quarterback (all love Mason, all love). At this point I’m not following the reports anymore because it’s all the same and no one will know until Aaron Rodgers makes a decision. So rather than sit on the edge of your seat waiting and reading blind noise, let’s get into the weeds and see what we’ll be getting with the 41-year-old and how much of an improvement he’ll actually be from Russell Wilson.

Before going into the stats I’ll start off by saying that I’m pro-signing Rodgers. Is it ideal? No, but he still has an elite arm who will be playing with a chip on his shoulder, and contrary to popular belief can still move pretty well, which he showed during the second half of last season after he got more comfortable with his achilles. There’s been a lot of chatter saying the Steelers should just roll out Mason Rudolph so they can get a lower draft pick to land a quarterback next year. The reality is though that with their defense Mason will be probably be good enough to get them to that 7-10 win range and they’ll be drafting in the same area again. So why not take that defense along with their new stud in Metcalf and insert a first-ballot hall of famer and take a run at it before Watt, Cam, and Minkah are retired or gone? Is it enough to take down the elite QBs in the AFC? Probably not, but it’s the best option they have right now to try and compete. Or is it?

How well does Aaron Rodgers really compare to once-upon-a-few-weeks darling in Russell Wilson? Since Russ didn’t play the first six weeks and Rodgers was clearly still hindered by the achilles during that time, I opted to do a comparison of the two from Weeks 7-18. This isn’t taking account opponents, injuries, or weather which obviously play a big role in game-to-game performance, but those are part of football and are things good quarterbacks need to overcome. Knowing that, take a look at the below insights and let me know your thoughts on if the Steelers should sign Rodgers or run it back with Russ.

Note: The Steelers had a bye Week 9, the Jets Week 12

EPA

The above graph shows the EPA (Expected Points Added) per game from Weeks 7-18 for Rodgers and Wilson (though technically it’s for the Steelers and the Jets, as EPA is a team stat). If you’re unfamiliar, EPA is a calculated measure that takes a bunch of different factors (down, distance, field position, etc.) into account to see how well a team performs compared to their expectation. Obviously this depends on a lot more than quarterback play, but because quarterbacks largely dictate how well a team performs it’s a solid gauge of their performance. As you can see the lines are very similar with a lot of peaks and valleys and their overall averages within this time frame being almost identical (Rodgers 0.02, Wilson 0.03). To put those numbers into perspective, the league’s leader in EPA, Lamar Jackson, had a season-long average of 0.39. It’s only one stat and I’m the last person to dig too deep into such a calculated measure like this, but it is interesting to see how similar the two are while Rodgers had much better supporting cast.

Note: In Week 17 the Jets got absolutely boat raced by the Bills and Rodgers didn’t play the 4th quarter. He played terribly the first three quarters so that week will be included in all visuals, but I thought it was fair to mention he missed out on a quarter of football

Passing Yards

Another similar trend, we see both players with up and down performances, Rodgers being brought down a bit by Week 17 and Russ being bumped up by his stellar Week 13 vs the Bengals. Averages are again very close within three yards of each other. What stands out to me the most here is Rodgers down the stretch. Excluding the Bills game he threw for at least 250 yards every game from the beginning of December, boosting the case that he started to get his feet (or achilles) under him again.

Scoring Drives

Here we’re looking at the percentage of drives that ended in a score (either a touchdown or field goal). Keep in mind this is looking at every drive in each game, so it includes kneel outs at the end of halfs and games. You can see the inconsistency from both quarterbacks again, with Wilson having about a 5% higher average (though we know that’s attributed to the many drives the Steelers ended with a field goal, shoutout Boz). The more I see these graphics the more impressed I become with what Wilson did with a sub-par supporting cast.

Passing First Downs

Are you seeing the trend? Finishing up with two more stats that fall more on the quarterback, here we have passing first downs per game. Very similar stuff again, with Rodgers being a little more consistent other than Week 17. I honestly thought I’d see Rodgers separate himself more here with all the dump off first downs he had to Breece Hall along with the connection between him and Davante Adams getting better as the season went on, but it’s clear the Jets struggled to move the ball as much as the Steelers did.

Long Pass Plays

Now in the grand scheme of the NFL I wouldn’t necessarily consider a 10 yard passing play “long”, but with how miserable the Steelers offense has been in recent years I think we can agree more passing plays going for 10 yards would be a breath of fresh air. Another almost identical graph, we see the same pattern throughout all the comparisons. Maybe it’s safe to say that not everyone is Tom Brady or Matthew Stafford and below-average play is what you’re going to get with aged quarterbacks.

Before concluding, a couple other points I wanted to make to help make your own decision in this comparison:

• Both quarterbacks benefited from garbage time during window of play – Russ we know during the losing streaks, and the Jets had three blowout losses
• According to Pro Football Network’s offensive line rankings, the Steelers had the 25th best offensive line and the Jets the 26th
• Russell Wilson had much more help on the ground, as the Steelers had the league’s 11th most rushing yards while the Jets the 31st
• Per Pro Football Reference, the Jets had more than double the amount of dropped passes (49, 2nd most in the league) then the Steelers (22)
• The Steelers defense provided a lot more support to their offense, with the 2nd best turnover margin in the NFL (+16) compared to the Jets at -2, and allowed four less points per game
• Rodgers had to deal with both his head coach and offensive coordinator getting fired mid-season

Going into this analysis, I for whatever reason expected Rodgers to be better than Wilson in most areas, but my clouded frustration of how bad the Steelers have been on offense recently makes me forget that there’s other teams that are also bad and sometimes even worse. Does this change my opinion on whether I want the Steelers to sign Rodgers? No.

The city, the fans, and most importantly the team needs an injection of life and excitement to help believe again. Like I said earlier, it’s extremely unlikely Rodgers would help them take the next step to get past the elite AFC quarterbacks. But what we do already know with 100% certainty is that Russ can’t do it. Giving him Metcalf could make a difference for sure, but teams don’t respect or fear Russell Wilson. He’s corny as hell off the field and nothing more than a game manager who doesn’t throw over the middle on the field, making him and the New York Giants would be a perfect fit. Rodgers on the other hand? I mean it’s Aaron freaking Rodgers, the dude is an absolute dog who can make throws that we haven’t seen in Pittsburgh since pre-elbow surgery Big Ben. Sure he may be not be as mobile as he once was, but there’s no question in my mind defenses still respect him. I mean they have to – he had more more touchdown passes last year than Mahomes, Herbert, Stafford, Love, Daniels, Stroud, and Murray at 40 years old. Maybe I’m crazy, but Watt and Heyward are going to retire as Steelers legends, so you need to do good by them and provide them belief that the team has a chance in their final years, and that chance, at least for 2025, is Aaron Rodgers.