Aaron Rodgers largely looked incredibly sharp in the Pittsburgh Steelers’ Week 1 victory over the New York Jets. But according to one of the greatest quarterbacks to ever wear a Steelers uniform, Ben Roethlisberger, there is one particular factor to worry about when it comes to Rodgers.
Rodgers was able to pick apart his former team en route to a 34-32 victory on Sunday. But it wasn’t for a lack of effort from a tenacious Jets defensive line, which got to Rodgers with sacks on four separate occasions.
Speaking about the Week 1 result on his podcast, ‘Footbahlin’ with Ben Roethlisberger,” the former Steelers star shared why he believes it is certainly possible that Rodgers’ body may not be able to hold up if the Steelers’ offensive line doesn’t do a better job protecting him.
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“The positive that I saw was Aaron Rodgers threw the ball. Listen, his arm works just fine. He can throw the ball all over the place, down the field, short passes, screens, spread the ball around,” said Roethlisberger. The only thing is, there were four sacks. None of those that I saw were Aaron’s fault. There were times when he came up with play fake and there was a guy in his face, maybe some coverage stuff, but it wasn’t anything like he’s just back there holding the ball forever.
“So, I’m very encouraged by the way Aaron played. My concern is going to be, moving forward, can Aaron take a beating like that every week? Not at that age because some of those, even when he didn’t get sacked, he got hit so hard, he came off the ground, and he’s forty-something, and that’s not good.”
It’s certainly a very reasonable concern from Roethlisberger. Rodgers is just two years removed from an Achilles tear. And while Rodgers showed no ill effects of the sacks he took on Sunday, it could become an issue as we get down the stretch of the season.
The Steelers’ starting offensive line is still incredibly young, with all of the starters on the offensive line aside from Isaac Seumalo having three or fewer years of NFL experience under their belt.
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Maybe the Steelers’ offensive line will continue to grow and better protect Rodgers moving forward. Or, maybe they are simply too inexperienced to keep Rodgers clean on a regular basis.
Either way, allowing four sacks as they did on Sunday is not going to be a winning strategy in most weeks.
So while there are some very clear positive takeaways from the Steelers offense heading into a Week 2 matchup against the Seattle Seahawks, there are also areas that need to be sured up.
The post Steelers Legend Still Concerned About Aaron Rodgers After Week 1 win appeared first on Newsweek.
