The Pittsburgh Steelers have begun developing rookie third-round quarterback Drew Allar, and the work is already starting at the most basic level. During practice, Allar was running at about half speed while focusing on his footwork as the team worked to reshape how he moves and throws.
reporter Brooke Pryor said the Steelers are essentially uninstalling everything Allar has learned and reuploading their own methods and fundamentals and mechanics with him. She added, “I watched Mike McCarthy and quarterback coach Tom Arth be very intentional with Allar.” That sort of hands-on reset is not usually given to a quarterback expected to arrive polished; it is the kind of attention teams reserve for a player they believe can be rebuilt into something better.
Allar said afterward that the Steelers are working on widening his base and keeping him off his toes. McCarthy said the goal is to “help him process even more and just move faster throughout things as he gets acclimated to the NFL.” In other words, the club is not merely polishing a prospect. It is trying to change the foundation under him.
The approach invites an obvious comparison to the Aaron Rodgers treatment, when a veteran quarterback spent time behind the scenes while the offense was shaped around him. Rodgers, now 42, also became part of the broader development model the Steelers are drawing from, and the parallel is not accidental. The report says the team is undoing earlier habits from Allar’s football career and replacing them with its own methods, the kind of controlled, repetitive work that can take time before it shows up in a game.
That same long view also helps explain why Will Howard keeps coming up in the conversation. Howard has often been regarded as a potential future starter, and he spent a season of development behind Aaron Rodgers in 2025. For Pittsburgh, the message is clear: the quarterback room is being built with patience, not panic, and Allar’s early reps are being treated as an investment rather than a test.
The tension is in whether that patience holds once the speed of the NFL arrives. A quarterback can be redone in practice, but Sundays do not pause for footwork drills. For now, the Steelers are betting that starting over with Drew Allar is the fastest way to get him where they think he can go.
