LATROBE, Pa. -- When I picked Mason Rudolph to beat out Josh Dobbs for the Steelers' No. 2 quarterback spot, it was because of his advantage in throwing accuracy combined with his growth in the playbook being too much for Mike Tomlin and Randy Fichtner to pass up.
He won the quarterback battle with Dobbs in the first week and now gets his chance to start Saturday against the Chiefs in the Steelers' second preseason game. What I'll be looking at more than Rudolph's arm is how he manipulates the Chiefs' defense with his eyes, disguising his intended targets. And Fichtner needs to let Rudolph sling the ball around to see what he's got.
Rudolph finished last week with five completions on eight attempts for 91 yards and two touchdowns. Those are good numbers, but 59 of those yards came on a very impressive 59-yard catch-and-run from Johnny Holton when Rudolph checked down to the open man and watched Holton do the work.
There's nothing bad about that, and in fact that's what young quarterbacks need to do better — find their open receivers. But Rudolph has much more to show than some check-down passes. His timing with James Washington showed he's ready to sling the ball.
Rudolph lines up in the shotgun, recognizes the single coverage on Washington and throws the perfect back-shoulder pass for the score. The cornerback never has a chance to see the pass coming while so committed to Washington, making it the perfectly placed pass:
But Rudolph needs to cycle through his reads and disguise his targets better. If you notice on the above touchdown, Rudolph's head goes right to Washington and stays there the whole play. It worked there because the play was so fast, but sometimes it can backfire.
Rudolph has had his share of rough practices at Saint Vincent College this training camp. His worst moments come when the Steelers' secondary has locked onto his eyes and jumped his passes. Twice in the same drill earlier this week, Brian Allen jumped passes from Rudolph when he stared down his target for too long. One resulted in a simple breakup, another in an interception returned for a touchdown.
Rudolph already has good head movement and can make his progressions, he just needs to do it more consistently. I was impressed with how he stuck with the play on his touchdown pass to Zach Gentry last week, seeing all his reads covered but being patient enough to wait for Gentry to lose the coverage in the back of the end zone:
I've been impressed by Rudolph's ability to make pre-snap reads since his days at Oklahoma State. But I've kept close notes on his ability to move his eyes through his reads strategically to open up opportunities for his true target. Being able to do that, to look-off safeties, is one of the key traits of franchise quarterbacks.
The moment I was most impressed with Rudolph in that regard last week was on a play that wasn't a completed pass. Watch how Rudolph comes off the snap looking to his right, then cycles over to Tevin Jones on the sideline. Jones is in single coverage with the safety too far away and the ball is properly placed, but Jones fails to get his second foot in bounds:
This is Rudolph's time to shine against a first team defense and with the full assortment of the Steelers' receiving corps healthy and ready to go. But it'll be up to Fichtner to see how many chances he'll get to rip passes over the field. The Steelers are presumed to be looking for a more balanced offense in 2019, which may mean more running plays.
But with Rudolph looking like the guy they want to be Ben Roethlisberger's heir, it's enticing to see more of what he can do.
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