Legendary Pittsburgh Steelers’ four-time Super Bowl winner and current Fox broadcaster, Terry Bradshaw likes what he sees in the team’s rookie quarterback, Kenny Pickett.
The 1978 NFL MVP joined The Herd with Colin Cowherd on Wednesday to talk about some of the quarterback play around the league and inevitably Cowherd wanted his opinion on the first-year Pittsburgh signal-caller who Bradshaw wanted to see start for Pittsburgh at the beginning of the season.
Bradshaw told Cowherd that he had watched and loved the Ocean Township, NJ native during his college career with the University of Pittsburgh and thought his staying in the Steel City as he makes the leap from college to the pros “was a perfect match.”
“Is he a super A talent? No, but he’s an upper echelon B,” Bradshaw said. “I think they have their guy. He almost has the ‘it’ thing. If you can not have the ‘it’ thing, I get that, but he’s a guy that can get ‘it’ once they put some pieces around him.”
Cowherd referred to San Fransico 49ers quarterback, Jimmy Garoppolo, another quarterback Bradshaw said he loves, as a currently established guy in the league who falls into the tier of quarterbacks Bradshaw can see Pickett falling into and pointed out he made the Super Bowl in 2020 only to fall to the Kansas City Chiefs.
The two-time Super Bowl MVP went on to explain in order to be a good quarterback in the NFL you don’t need to necessarily have a ton of arm strength and referenced another former 49er, Billy Kilmer, as another guy who didn’t have an elite arm, but was a two-time All-Pro for the Washington Commanders.
“You could have an arm like Billy Kilmer,” Bradshaw said. “As long as you can sit in the pocket, read coverages and not pannic. He does all of that.”
As Bradshaw outlined, it takes time for a player, specifically a quarterback, to develop and the 24-year-old is certainly showing signs he’s progressing in the right direction.
Since turning the ball over a total of 10 times with eight interceptions and a pair of fumbles lost through his first five starts, he has calmed down and didn’t give the ball away at all in Pittsburgh’s 20-10 win over the New Orleans Saints or the Week 11 loss to the Cincinnati Bengals.
One specific area the 2022 Heisman Trophy finalist has made a “significant” improvement according to head coach Mike Tomlin is his awareness to step up in the pocket, rather than bail backwards.
“Could he be progressing faster? Absolutely,” Tomlin said during his weekly press conference on Tuesday. “But he’s moving in the right direction.”
In the loss to the Bengals, Pickett had an excellent first half completing 14 of 19 passes for 141 yards and the longest touchdown pass of his young career connecting with fellow rookie, George Pickens for a gorgeous 24-yarder. The second half left more to be desired, but that’s part of the growing pains of having a young quarterback, just ask the New York Jets or Jacksonville Jaguars fans how things are going with their recently drafted first-round guys.
The organization clearly believes in his talent and his work ethic, they’ve surrounded him with a pretty good group of pass catchers and running backs, and if they can help an offensive line that still needs work, Pickett should be set up to have success at the pro level. Is he going to be an elite quarterback? Maybe not, but he could still be a very good one.
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