The Pittsburgh Steelers took part in rookie minicamp in the last few days and one clip of quarterback Drew Allar has gone viral, and not for a good reason.
This time of year, we see clips of rookies taking part in their first practices with the team and overreactions, both positive and negative, are common.
One of the Steelers’ third-round picks in the 2026 NFL Draft, Allar is the victim of the latter overreaction right now after a clip of him working in practice over the weekend went viral.
The clip shows Allar working on his footwork and it’s immediately clear just how slow he looks and how much development his footwork needs.
If we didn’t know any better, we’d say Allar has cement in his shoes.
While that clip didn’t look great, we are still way too early in the process to be worried about Allar.
Drew Allar starting from the ground up
After practice, Allar revealed footwork has been a point of emphasis during rookie minicamp.
The rookie admits he’s starting “from the ground up” in that area in the NFL and that’s abundantly clear from watching the viral video of him.
“It’s really just about tweaking things,” he said. “There’s a lot of different philosophies. Every coach probably teaches footwork a little bit different and with Coach McCarthy, he has his beliefs. They’ve shown they work very well with who he has been around. It’s about me buying into that and getting it as consistent as possible.
“With all the QBs he’s worked with, they’ve had a tremendous amount of success. But I have to start from the ground up.”
Luckily, Allar should have plenty of top-notch help.
Head coach Mike McCarthy is an excellent teacher for quarterbacks, and Aaron Rodgers can also help, assuming he actually re-signs in Pittsburgh instead of retiring.
Will Allar play in 2026?
Feb 28, 2026; Indianapolis, IN, USA; Penn State quarterback Drew Allar (QB02) during the NFL Scouting Combine at Lucas Oil Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Kirby Lee-Imagn Images
There’s a very good chance Allar won’t see a single NFL snap in 2026.
That’s because the expectation has been that Rodgers will return to his starting role this coming season.
So, it would take an injury to Rodgers for Allar to even have a chance to see the field, and even then he would have to jump at least one other quarterback on the depth chart to be next in line.
Pittsburgh also has Will Howard and Mason Rudolph on the roster, although it remains to be seen if the Steelers would carry a fourth quarterback if Rodgers returns.
Seeing as how the Steelers don’t have a locked-in long-term solution at quarterback, it would make sense to hold on to Howard and ditch Rudolph in that situation.
The good news with all of this is Allar is going to have plenty of time to develop before he sees the field, and it looks like he’s going to need every minute of that time.
