Rooney rightly recognizes that it's all about quarterback play

There isn't an interview in our city that's parsed quite like the annual Art Rooney II session with select reporters at the UPMC Rooney Sports Complex, and this one, with the Steelers seemingly at a franchise pivoting point, might be picked apart even more than the norm.

Heck, I was already doing it right there in the room, aiming for what'd be the most succinct summation of the man's overall sentiment.

Try it with me, and bear in mind these aren't in any order:

"Yeah, I think there's an urgency," Rooney'd reply when asked about his team's failure to win an NFL playoff game since 2016. "I think everybody, from myself to Mike to guys who've been on the team for a while -- T.J., Cam, everybody -- we've had enough of this. It’s time to get some wins. It’s time to take these next steps. I think there's some urgency here, for sure."

Referencing Mike Tomlin, T.J. Watt and Cam Heyward, of course.

Strong statement. Easy to see the exasperation. 

"I think the players still respond to Mike, and that's No. 1," Rooney'd reply when asked why Tomlin's going to have his contract extended this summer, a stance he reaffirmed here. "He still has the key characteristics that we saw when we hired him. He can keep the attention of a group of 20-year-olds for a whole season and keep them in the fight for the whole way. I still feel good about Mike. Obviously, if I didn't, we’d make a change. Iif we didn't think Mike was able to lead us to a championship, he wouldn't be here. That's why he's here."

Another strong statement. So the exasperation isn't, in his eyes, based on the head coach.

"In terms of the next step," Rooney'd say regarding 2024 and beyond, "we need to make sure we do everything we can to get quality play out of our quarterback position going forward. We still feel good about Kenny Pickett and his future, but he knows he needs to work hard to take the next step. We've talked about that. One of the things we liked about Kenny and his career at Pitt was how hard he worked and how he took a step every year. We're looking for that to happen here."

OK. Very similar to Tomlin's after-the-season assessment of Pickett, where he inserted a "but" almost immediately.

"Mason Rudolph," Rooney'd keep going on that same thought train, "came in and showed, I think, what we're capable of when we do get quality play at the quarterback position."

Oh.

"I think it's fair to say that I do feel that we're closer this year at this stage of the game than we were at this point last year," Rooney'd reply when asked about the state of the Steelers as a whole. "I thought we had a really solid rookie class and a few guys who really stepped in and are solid starters for the future. We need to do that again. We need to have another good draft class. But yeah, I think we have a core group of players that ... we can compete with this group. And as I said, I think the biggest thing we need is quality play at the quarterback position."

Oh.

With me on this one yet?

Let's keep rolling ...

“The things about Kenny that we’ve always liked were his toughness, his competitiveness, his desire to be a winner," Rooney'd reply when asked what he likes about Pickett and where he needs to improve. "He has all of those kinds of intangibles. What I think we need from him is to continue to develop to be a quarterback who can read a defense quickly and get the offense into the best play for a given situation when he comes out of the huddle. He’s learned and has got some experience with that, and he’ll continue to work on that.”

Liked the intangibles. Wants more from the tangibles. Also similar to Tomlin's after-the-season assessment, which was mostly about moxie.

“I think Mason really showed, No. 1, I think he did show what we’re capable of on offense with the personnel that we have here right now," Rooney'd reply when asked if Rudolph's four-game performance was being viewed by the Steelers as a small sample size or as more of a launching point. "That’s encouraging in terms of Mason’s ceiling, let’s say. I don’t know that we’ve seen his ceiling yet. We drafted him high for a reason, and it felt like he had a lot of ability, so I think we saw that. He’s probably going to have some options, so it's going to be a question of whether he wants to come back and whether we can make a deal to get him back."

Intangibles and tangibles.

"We appreciate what Mason did, and we're interested in bringing Mason back."

Well, all right, then. 

"We still feel comfortable with Kenny, but with that being said, you can’t discount what Mason did and you can’t discount the fact that having competition will be good for everybody. I think Mike feels that way, and we all feel that way. I'd say there's still more to come to see who's in the quarterback room when we start camp this summer."

Sounds like the "competition" might be really real.

• I asked Rooney why it took so long for management and coaches to see that Rudolph could perform at this level: "It's hard to say whether he would have had the same results if he started the whole season. I mean, this wasn't the first season he played for us. Overall, I think Mason's results as a starting quarterback in this league have been positive, for the most part. We know that, and we know that going forward. That's one of the reasons why we want to have him back. Whether he should have played more prior to this, I'm not gonna speculate on that at this point." No one's going to admit misfiring on this. No one.

• There wasn't much to share on the offensive coordinator front, though Rooney did stress, "No. 1, to be clear, it's Mike's hire. Head coaches hire their coordinators. I think be a mistake for me to try to screw up the lines of authority, let's say, in terms of how things are supposed to work."

• Related and relevant, Rooney also confirmed my reporting at the time of Matt Canada's firing that the call was made by Tomlin: "Well, it's not something that you want to do or like to do," he'd say, referring to any midseason coaching change. "Mike made the decision that it was time to make a change. Those kinds of things are not what you hope for when you start a season. I'm not sure what we learned from it other than saying we don't want to have to do that again. This is an important hire to get the right person in there to help this offense take the next steps."

• This might've been the meatiest remark regarding a new OC: "Mike's in the process of hiring a new offensive coordinator, so we'll have some changes on the staff on the offensive side. We're looking forward to having someone come in and take a fresh approach, which can help our young players grow and perform, have the offense perform at a consistently high level." Didn't sound like awesome news for remaining positional coaches.

• It's beyond absurd that our city's never hosted a Super Bowl -- holding one in New Jersey forever killed the cold/outdoor arguments -- or even an NFL Draft, so it was good to hear Rooney sound confident that we'll soon have the latter: "Yeah, we're, I would say, deep in the process of preparing the bid to bringing the draft to Pittsburgh. I think we're optimistic that we'll bring it here in the not-too-distant future."

• Rooney confirmed my reporting from a few months ago that the Steelers are putting together an ambitious plan for the next phase of Acrisure Stadium's existence, this with seven years left on the team's lease there: "We are, yeah. We're going through a stadium assessment at this point, really looking at what it's going to take to be in this stadium for the next 10, 20 years, whatever it's going to be. It's a process. Hired some consultants to help us look at it. We like the stadium, think it's a great facility. With the right kinds of improvements, it can continue to be our home for a long time."

• I followed up: He didn't happen to have a dome handy? "Not going to be a dome soon. I don't see that happening here."

• The entire session, involving about a dozen media members, lasted 23 minutes at a long table set up by the team. It wasn't video-recorded. These are always a little different than a standard press conference, but not much. After a short opening statement, Rooney took questions the rest of the time in an open forum. Zero restrictions. Good stuff. Always appreciated.

• The complete transcript's here.