While the Pittsburgh Steelers have Aaron Rodgers for the 2025 season, Ben Roethlisberger isn’t very confident that the team’s new starting quarterback will be sticking around after that.
Rodgers becomes the Steelers’ sixth starting quarterback since Roethlisberger retired after the 2021 season. Of the previous five quarterbacks, none started more than 24 games for the black and gold. While Rodgers may provide the Steelers with better quarterback play than his recent predecessors, Roethlisberger nonetheless expects another brief tenure when it comes to the 41-year-old Rodgers and his time as the Steelers’ quarterback.
“I don’t think he’s got much more after this year,” Roethlisberger recently said on his podcast. “I think this might be it for him. Personally. You could ask, ‘How do I know?’ I don’t know. I’m just guessing. In terms of, you’re coming off an Achilles — coming off my elbow, my first year back, I felt like I was 100 [percent] — I wasn’t even [close]. You don’t realize that you’re not 100 until the next year when you are 100. … He’s going to feel better, but it doesn’t mean that he’s going to have two or three years left. I think this might be his last go.”
Rodgers will be two years removed from his major Achilles injury that essentially wiped out his entire 2023 season. Usually, it takes an athlete two full seasons after a major injury to return to form, if they do at all.
In 2020, Roethlisberger got off to a hot start a year after he missed most of the 2019 season after undergoing elbow surgery. But he and the Steelers faded down the stretch, losing four of their last five games that included a wild-card playoff loss to the Cleveland Browns.
Roethlisberger returned in 2021 for his final season with the Steelers. While he and the Steelers were good enough to make the playoffs that year, it was clear that Roethlisberger wasn’t the same player that he was a year before his major injury, when he led the NFL in passing yards and also set a career-high in touchdown passes.
It was then that Roethlisberger hung up his cleats for good. And, based on his recent comments, it’s clear that Roethlisberger feels that Rodgers may come to a similar decision next offseason.
Last year (his first following his major Achilles injury), Rodgers threw 28 touchdowns against 11 picks. Rodgers’ numbers last year are more impressive when you consider that his head coach was fired and his offensive coordinator was demoted after five weeks, he played behind a subpar offensive line and played most of the season while dealing with nagging injuries. Despite those things, Rodgers found a way to put up decent numbers while playing in each of the Jets‘ 17 regular season games.
It’s reasonable to expect that Rodgers to perform at a higher level this year, despite the obvious fact that he is a year older. In addition to being a year further removed from his major injury, Rodgers has the luxury of throwing to a two-time Pro Bowl wideout in DK Metcalf while playing behind a young but promising offensive line.
There is also the possibility that Rodgers has another season that is below his level of expectation. As noted above, the Steelers have a young offensive line. If they struggle to live up to their potential, and Rodgers sustains too many hits, the 2025 season could be a reprise of what transpired for Rodgers during his final year with the Jets. But even if the line does play well and Rodgers gets through the year relatively healthy, he may discover — like Roethlisberger did in 2021 — that he just isn’t physically good enough to play at the level that he expects of himself.
Either way, the 2025 season is undoubtedly a fork in the road for Rodgers. If he and the Steelers play well, it’s realistic to expect that both sides will want to run it back in 2026. Conversely, if Rodgers and the Steelers struggle in 2026, the 2025 season could very well be the end of what has been a Hall of Fame career for Rodgers.
While he doesn’t think that Rodgers’ is a longterm solution, Roethlisberger expressed optimism in rookie sixth-round pick Will Howard. Howard also has a budding relationship with Roethlisberger.
“We actually have the same agent, so we got connected through that,” Howard recently said on Up & Adams when asked about his relationship with Roethlisberger. “He’s been really good. He’s been super supportive of me through this whole process. Throughout now being a Steeler, getting to know him, he’s been really helpful for me. He texted me checking last week, you know, just been a really good mentor. I can see him being a good mentor for me going forward. He’s been super nice to me so far.”
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Author: Bryan DeArdo
June 16, 2025 | 3:10 pm
