Pittsburgh Steelers quarterback Mason Rudolph will get his first NFL start on Sunday against the San Francisco 49ers. Rudolph flashed some skills coming off the bench last week for Ben Roethlisberger, but now we will get a full 14 games to see if he’s the quarterback of the future.
ESPN went through every starting quarterback to talk about what his biggest weakness is. For Rudolph, they identify second-read throws as his kryptonite. Here’s what they had to say about it:
Rudolph will certainly be tested as he takes over for Ben Roethlisberger. One thing he struggled with during his time at Oklahoma State and in his limited duty so far in the NFL is his ability to make plays outside of structure and if the play breaks down. Through two preseasons with the Steelers, Rudolph finished with a 54.3 passing grade on his second-read throws, a figure that ranks 40th among the 51 quarterbacks with at least 10 pass attempts on their second read. He is an athletic player, so if he can maneuver his way around the pocket to buy time, he should do just fine in the Pittsburgh scheme.
Considering Rudolph came from an Oklahoma State offense that was almost 100 percent predetermined at the snap, it’s easy to point at going through reads and progressions as what he needs to work on the most. It will be interesting to see how much Rudolph has improved over the last year and how much the Steelers offense is going to be tailored to Rudolph and minimize how much thought he has to put into his reads.
