2021 NFL Draft: 5 teams most likely to take a quarterback

As with the New Orleans Saints, the Pittsburgh Steelers have an aging future Pro Football Hall of Famer at the quarterback position. While Drew Brees missed five games last year with a thumb injury, Ben Roethlisberger missed more than double that with a torn UCL in his throwing elbow. “Big Ben” is coming off Tommy John surgery and he’s got maybe two years left in the tank.

Many people thought the Steelers could be in the market to draft someone like Jalen Hurts out of Oklahoma in day two, but he went to the in-state rival Philadelphia Eagles. Pittsburgh didn’t draft a quarterback and has opted to go with Mason Rudolph and Devlin Hodges as Roethlisberger’s backups for another season. This may end up being their undoing during the 2020 NFL season.

Though Pittsburgh could still sign Cam Newton in free agency, this feels like a franchise who will want to appropriately replace Roethlisberger with a first-round pick. It took about two decades for the Steelers to successfully bridge the gap from Terry Bradshaw to Roethlisberger. They know what it’s like to have stop-gap starting quarterback after stop-gap starting quarterback.

Pittsburgh will be too good to be picking near the top 10 in the 2021 NFL Draft to draft a franchise quarterback. Then again, Roethlisberger wasn’t a top-10 pick back in 2004 out of Miami (Ohio). While they may wait until 2022 at the absolute latest to replace Roethlisberger, the Steelers could be in the market to do so should he have another injury-riddled 2020 campaign.