Steelers' biggest offseason nightmare just became an in-season reality

The Pittsburgh Steelers’ season isn’t over after another routine embarrassment in primetime. They’re still at the top of the AFC North, even if their grip is fading quickly.

But this season, as fans knew from the beginning, would go as Aaron Rodgers goes. The 41-year-old came into this, what will likely be his final season, with plenty of doubters casting reasons why this experiment would blow up in Mike Tomlin, Omar Khan, and Art Rooney II’s faces.

The loss to Los Angeles didn’t end the Steelers’ season. It did, however, give every Rodgers doubter this past offseason plenty of vindication that, in the end, they were right.

Pittsburgh Steelers’ gamble on a 41-year-old Aaron Rodgers is aging poorly

Every Steelers fan had to compartmentalize their trepidation with the Rodgers signing this season. Even the most fervent among Steelers Nation who wanted nothing to do with the polarizing quarterback had to place some amount of faith in him to play like the guy who’s destined for the Hall of Fame.

In many ways, he has. His 18 touchdown passes are top-5 in the NFL, and he’s boosted the Steelers’ red-zone efficiency through the roof compared to past seasons.

But the turnovers are starting to stack. The inefficiency of the offense before they even get a chance in the red zone makes the improvements there a moot point. The offense can’t reliably run the ball, and Rodgers doesn’t have enough weapons to lean on, nor the protection required to make the plays he built his career on.

At times this season, Rodgers has channelled that old dog in him to move around the pocket and make plays. But the Chargers saw that as an exploitable opportunity, and sacked him three times, including the safety early in the game.

Rodgers turned in one of the worst performances of his career against Los Angeles, in what was effectively a West Coast home game against a beat-up, injured Chargers’ squad. He showed his age, shuffling those “One More Year?” articles from last week to the internet algorithm’s equivalent of a landfill. 

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Rodgers was wildly inaccurate under pressure, shying away from contact to deliver key throws, such as his pirouetting throw to Kenneth Gainwell in the flats on 3rd and 6 in Pittsburgh’s last gasp to make the game competitive. No one is asking Rodgers to eat hits on the jaw at his age, but it's not unnoticed that he's avoiding contact at the expense of some throws.

Every unsuccessful drive seems to end with Rodgers yelling at somebody, whether because they didn’t execute their blocking assignment, ran the wrong route, or did anything that wasn’t his fault. To Rodgers’ credit, a lot of the offense’s struggles this season haven’t been his fault.

But getting hit unnecessarily, coming up short drive after drive, and playing as badly as he did Sunday night wears on the body and mind a man who came back for the love of the game for one last hurrah to show that he shouldn’t have the twilight of his career defined by the failings of the New York Jets’ franchise.

Those folks who, for one reason or another, warned Steelers fans that he might not be able to stand up to the rigors of the season, especially with the problems Pittsburgh has carried for nearly a decade now, can tell us all who wouldn’t listen, “Told ya so.”

Rodgers has seven more regular-season games to respond. He’s one of the greatest of all time. I’ve been hard-pressed to doubt him myself. But the more this season wears on, the more the headline fits. The worst way this season could unfold is exactly what’s happening, and so many in the football world warned us all.