The Steelers could be looking for a quarterback next offseason, but here are three high-profile signal-callers they may want to avoid in the 2022 NFL Draft.
Ben Roethlisberger got quite the send-off in his final home game of the season against the Cleveland Browns. While the Pittsburgh Steelers quarterback still hasn’t directly come out to say that he is retiring, we all know this to be the case at this point.
Even if they elect to go with a stop-gap free agent, the Steelers will no doubt be heavily scouting the 2022 NFL Draft class for the next quarterback who could be a franchise guy in Pittsburgh. While there are some quarterbacks I would love to take a chance on, Pittsburgh may want to avoid these three high-profile passers:
Malik Willis, Liberty
After transferring from Auburn and stringing together a very good season for Liberty in 2020, I had really high hopes for Malik Willis. In fact, I thought that he had the upside to elevate himself to the number one quarterback in the 2022 NFL Draft class with a strong season.
Unfrotauntly, Willis was somewhat disappointing this season and seemed a regress in many ways from his 2020 campaign. Though he still has immense athleticism with a great arm, there were too many concerns that I had this year to take him in the first round of the NFL Draft.
In addition to his yards per attempt dropping in 2021, Willis also threw twice as many interceptions this year (12) and was really careless with the ball quite frequently. It’s also concerning to me that such a high-profile draft prospect had such difficulty with very winnable games on his schedule.
After Liberty went 10-1 last season, Willis was able to lead his team to just an 8-5 record in 2021 with losses coming against Lousiana-Monroe, Syracuse, Lousiana, and Army. He’s a high-risk, high-reward player who should be avoided with Pittsburgh’s first-round pick.