Positive Russell Wilson injury news means the Steelers officially have a QB controversy

The Pittsburgh Steelers had a quarterback battle on their hands all offseason. Justin Fields and Russell Wilson were both brought in with the idea that they could be starting quarterbacks on a playoff-caliber football team, but only one of the two could be named QB1 for the Steelers.

It ended up being Wilson that won the job over Fields — until Wilson went down with a lower leg injury before Week 1, settling things for at least a couple of weeks. Since then, Fields has stepped in and played pretty well, looking much better than the quarterbacks that Pittsburgh has sent out there the last few seasons. But, while Fields has been on the field going to battle with the Steelers, Wilson has been slowly making his way back to the practice field, one step at a time.

Though there have been background conversations about who the starter should be when Wilson returns, none of these conversations held much weight with Wilson inactive. The idea of a quarterback battle has reemerged of late, though, as Fields and the Steelers have lost both of their last two games.

Steelers QB battle heating up as Russell Wilson returns as full participant at practice

Amid that losing streak, it seems as though Wilson is nearing a return to the roster. For the first time since his injury, he was a full participant at practice and looked pretty solid and smooth going through drills at practice.

With Wilson getting practice reps as a full participant, signs are beginning to indicate that he will be active on game day for the first time this year in Week 6 or Week 7 at the latest. And when Wilson officially becomes active, the QB battle will be back on for the Steelers.

The entire time that both quarterbacks were healthy, it was Wilson that led the way as the top dog in the QB room, but things may have changed in the five regular season weeks with Wilson on the sideline. Fields has played well, despite some underwhelming box scores, in each of his five starts this year. The two losses can be attributed to the entire team rather than something that could be blamed on who the quarterback was. But with the Steelers sitting at 3-2 now, Mike Tomlin may not cut Fields too much slack before he turns to Wilson.

At the end of the day, it was Wilson that won the QB battle out of camp. When both are active and healthy, the Steelers will have quite the tough decision to make at their most important position. Only Mike Tomlin knows how this is truly going to turn out.