Steelers plan extended look for Will Howard and Drew Allar as Aaron Rodgers sits again in preseason

Pittsburgh is turning its next preseason window into an audition for its younger quarterback group. With Aaron Rodgers continuing to sit, the Steelers will provide an extended look on Friday night against the New York Jets, giving Will Howard the start and allotting Drew Allar the remaining reps. The message from this plan is straightforward: the team wants to see how its developmental options handle live work against NFL starters for extended stretches.

Howard, who will be first up at quarterback, is positioned to be the primary driver of the Steelers’ opening sequences. In a preseason setting where coaches often balance repetition with experimentation, an assigned start typically carries extra responsibility, including first-team protection calls, early-game reads, and a fuller run at the playbook before the rotation begins. Friday’s game is also a chance for the Steelers to evaluate how quickly Howard can settle in and operate efficiently once the tempo rises.

Allar’s role is also notable. If Howard is the featured starter for the early portion, Allar will receive the remaining reps, which usually translates to a meaningful workload rather than a brief cameo. For a young quarterback, those additional snaps can be the difference between a partial impression and a more complete evaluation, especially when defenses adjust their coverage and disguises as the game progresses.

The backdrop for Pittsburgh’s decision is Rodgers’ continued absence. Rodgers sitting through the early preseason slate changes the internal calculus, because it compresses the “who gets the reps” conversation. Instead of a typical starter-led evaluation, the Steelers’ coaching staff is leaning heavily into a depth-and-development assessment, using the Jets matchup as a pressure-test against a different look than practice can provide.

For the Jets, the matchup offers a similar benefit at the quarterback level, but from the opponent’s perspective. Preseason games against Pittsburgh’s first and second groups can influence how both teams view their own roster depth, even if the results are not intended to settle anything permanently. Still, the way each quarterback communicates, protects the ball, and responds to in-game adjustments tends to stand out to evaluators in ways that stat lines alone cannot capture.

The Steelers’ focus on giving Howard and Allar extended work also reflects how teams manage roster and planning conversations in August. Quarterbacks are the one position where small decisions, timing, and chemistry often require repetitions to confirm that something is real. A longer runway in preseason is one of the more direct ways to create that confirmation, especially when the established veteran is not taking reps.

What to watch next is simple and practical: how Howard handles the early sequence and whether Pittsburgh’s offensive rhythm stays consistent once the rotation begins for Allar. Equally important will be how each quarterback handles the interaction between play design and live defense, including how they process coverage changes and execute the basics under game speed. With Rodgers still unavailable for this look, Friday night could be one of the more consequential “feel-out” games for the Steelers’ quarterback depth.

From a bigger picture standpoint, the Steelers’ plan does not guarantee a specific pecking order beyond the preseason. It does, however, increase the odds that Howard and Allar will generate more information than they would in a shorter appearance, which can matter for how Pittsburgh structures practices, how it calibrates third-down planning, and what it asks of its quarterback room as the preseason progresses. If Rodgers continues to sit beyond this game, the Steelers may keep leaning into the same approach, making quarterback development a central theme of the coming weeks.