How High is Too High for Steelers to Draft Tyler Shough?
The Pittsburgh Steelers are in the midst of conquering the most difficult task in all of sports: finding a franchise quarterback. Until that happens, they’re likely to remain firmly in the NFL’s middle class. For better or worse, it’s beyond obvious that the front office wasn’t too thrilled with the veteran options available to them in free agency. The next avenue would be taking a shot on one of the signal callers available in April’s 2025 NFL Draft. Few prospects helped their draft stock more this past season than Louisville’s Tyler Shough, who threw for 3,191 yards and 23 touchdowns, while only throwing six interceptions.
The Steelers hosted the transfer field general on a pre-draft visit to the UPMC Rooney Sports Complex. These visits are important to keep an eye on in terms of determining which prospects are high on their radar. For example, five of their draft picks last season (Troy Fautanu, Zach Frazier, Payton Wilson, Mason McCormick and Logan Lee) all took visits to the facility during this time frame last year. Beanie Bishop was among the local visits that took place and was brought on board after going undrafted out of West Virginia. Pittsburgh is desperate for a solution to the games most important position, could Shough be the guy to lead them out of quarterback purgatory?
At 6-foot-5, 219 pounds, Shough has prototypical size for what NFL teams have historically desired for the position. A true rarity in today’s era, he comes from a pro style offense that forced him to get under center, execute full field reads and put a lot on his plate in terms of getting the unit in the correct play call at the line of scrimmage. His arm really pops on tape with the ability to access all three levels of the field with ease and can easily crank up the velocity to fit the football away from defenders leverage and into keyhole-sized windows. There are some anticipatory throws on tape, most of which came outside the numbers on comebacks and out routes, and his ball placement on those reps was largely impressive. Shough is a true pocket passer that doesn’t want to hold on to the football for longer than he needs to, which is best explained by his extremely low 9.3% pressure to sack rate, per PFF.
That being said, calling him a statue would be a disservice to his athletic ability. Shough does at least exceed the threshold for the what modern quarterbacks need to be able to do with his legs and is capable of scrambling for a first down or diving in the end zone (Clemson) when necessary. He’s comfortable throwing on the run outside of the pocket. In the low red zone area against Notre Dame, he was flushed outside the pocket to his left, dropped his arm slot down and threw a sweet touchdown to the back of the end zone.
Another example of his creation capacity was in his final collegiate game versus Kentucky, where he showed off outstanding touch, going high back five for a score. Shough is efficient when operating RPOs and quick game concepts from the shotgun. His tape is littered with Sunday throws and from a talent perspective, there isn’t a system in the NFL that he couldn’t function in.
From a film perspective, almost all of Shough’s weaknesses revolve solely around his response to pressure. He’s got a nasty habit of falling off his platform and his accuracy suffers from his fadeaway tosses. When things get muddy in the pocket, his decision making takes a noticeable step backwards by putting the ball into harms way or chucking no-look checkdowns in the direction of his tailbacks.
There’s a obvious reluctancy to climb through the pocket and deliver throws down the field with defenders bearing down on him. His depth in the pocket needs to be shortened up in the NFL or edge rushers will be in his lap regularly and he doesn’t have the quick twitch ability to make guys miss in the backfield. Unlike other guys in this class, Shough has at least shown the ability to cycle through progressions and make it to the backside of concepts, but the speed at which that happens is still two ticks too slow.
What happens next with the Steelers quarterback room is anyones best guess but you can guarantee that at least one more move is coming down the pipeline at some point. Mason Rudolph’s a reliable backup quarterback option but even if they aren’t all in on trying to compete this fall, there are too many older veterans in their prime that you’d have a hard time selling that plan to.
Shough is an intriguing prospect because three consecutive season-ending injuries prevented him from gaining experience and ultimately delayed his eventual breakout season. When the pocket is clean, he can absolutely spin it and his best throws are as good as you’ll see from anyone in this class. He’ll be a 26-year old rookie but that won’t be a disqualifier for NFL teams. The real problematic part of his evaluation is that he simply doesn’t function nearly well enough under pressure and that’s a massive part of the life of a professional quarterback considering those guys are under fire on 35% of their drop backs on average.
Shough graded out as a fringe day two prospect after the conclusion of his evaluation process. if the Steelers don’t have another veteran inked to a contract before draft weekend, it’s reasonable to assume that they would take a look in his direction with the 83rd pick currently at their disposal.
But in a very weak quarterback class overall without many potential starters, it’s within the realm of possibilities that another team buys into the high-end flashes and rolls the dice on him earlier than this point. From a tools perspective, Shough has the size and arm talent to make noise in the league but he’ll need to show that he can do those things with more consistency when things around him aren’t squeaky clean.