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Brooke Pryor
PITTSBURGH — The whole lot about being again on the Steelers‘ UPMC Rooney Sports activities Advanced is acquainted to Mason Rudolph. The pinnacle coach, lots of his teammates, the media and the uniforms are all the identical.
Even the noise surrounding him — and never simply the rumble of the trains passing by the apply fields — is one thing the quarterback has grown used to over 5 roller-coaster NFL seasons.
“That is nothing new to me,” Rudolph mentioned Tuesday when requested in regards to the Aaron Rodgers-sized elephant within the quarterback room. “There’s been fixed noise — that’s the nature of the NFL, so I’ve been used to that for a very long time now. I do nothing however be one of the best I could be and assist our workforce get higher this spring.”
After a season in Tennessee, the 2018 third-round draft decide returned to the Steelers on a two-year, $7.5 million deal inked within the first week of free company. The Steelers signed Rudolph amid their pursuit of Rodgers, and so they proceed to attend on the four-time MVP to decide about his future.
“It is nice,” Rudolph mentioned of the Steelers performing rapidly in free company to signal him. “I have been an element [of teams] the place you leap on the shifting practice late within the spring, after which [others where] you are right here from the leap. So I’ve discovered to adapt to each, but it surely’s clearly good to be needed.”
Rudolph crammed the function of QB1 on Tuesday, main off the quarterback drills for a bunch that additionally contains 2025 sixth-round decide Will Howard and former Miami Dolphins quarterback Skylar Thompson.
“He is all the time been constant of who he’s,” tight finish Pat Freiermuth mentioned of Rudolph. “Clearly he has a hell of a possibility proper now, and so we’re all excited for him. He’ll come to work each single day and work exhausting, so it has been nice to see him work once more.”
For Rudolph, the objective of the following three weeks is to study the fundamentals of Arthur Smith’s offense — a system that is a departure from the final time he was in Pittsburgh and performed for coordinators Randy Fichtner, Matt Canada and interim OCs/playcallers Eddie Faulkner and Mike Sullivan.
When Rudolph final suited up for the Steelers in 2023, he helped lead a late-season surge that resulted in three straight wins and a playoff berth.
“We received video games down the stretch there and at an necessary time,” Rudolph mentioned. “I simply suppose we performed complementary soccer, and the extra time spent within the NFL, you study that it takes complementary soccer, particular groups, offense, protection. [Mike Tomlin] put the statistics up in the present day, I believe we had been just like the final two years, high two or two and three in turnover margin right here. In order that comes from the tradition that Mike T’s created with ball search and ball safety. That is one thing we’re all working in direction of.”
To Freiermuth, Rudolph’s capability to raise the workforce late within the 2023 season is among the many causes he is excited to have the quarterback within the fold.
“I like Mason,” Freiermuth mentioned. “He is a hell of a man, hell of a teammate, nice locker room man. And I imply, two years in the past we wanted to win three video games in a row to make it to the playoffs, and he stood within the pocket and delivered for us. So we received all the religion in him and it is thrilling to get again right here with him.”
And although new extensive receiver DK Metcalf wasn’t current Tuesday, Rudolph mentioned he linked with him in the course of the first two phases of the offseason program when Metcalf was round “in all probability half the time.”
“He is an unbelievable athlete,” Rudolph mentioned. “I believe all of us sort of knew that from watching the tape and watching him from throughout the league. However his eager to study and his questions — and he is inquisitive and he is very clever, very articulate. I assumed that was huge time. And he simply looks like a man who’s a low-ego man. He is been paid lots. He is been very profitable, however he is very hungry to enhance.”
