PITTSBURGH -- In 15 days, NFL commissioner Roger Goodell will announce the Pittsburgh Steelers' first-round selection in the 2026 NFL draft in front of what promises to be a raucous crowd of football fans on the city's North Shore.
A year ago, it was realistic to envision this moment being a seismic one in franchise history. The quarterback class was supposed to be overflowing with first-round talent, and the Steelers appeared positioned to draft their next franchise signal-caller after a one-year Aaron Rodgers stint in front of a hometown crowd. It could've been a Yinzer fairy tale.
But a lot happened in a year.
The once-robust quarterback class instead thinned out with some of the most intriguing candidates -- Texas' Arch Manning, Ole Miss' Trinidad Chambliss, Oregon's Dante Moore and South Carolina's LaNorris Sellers -- opting to return to college for at least one more season. That leaves the 2026 class with just one bona fide first-rounder in Indiana's Fernando Mendoza and a potential first-round pick in Alabama's Ty Simpson.
And Rodgers, whose performance during the 2025 season ranged from serviceable to vintage, seems poised to return for another year as the Steelers continue their search for a long-term answer at the position.
"We all agree that we're looking for that next franchise guy," Steelers general manager Omar Khan said in February from the NFL combine. "We're not there yet, and we may have the guy in the roster; we don't know. We're excited to work with Will [Howard]. But we know that it has to be addressed, and we're all looking for the same thing. We're just not there yet."
But just because the Steelers appear more likely to use their first-round pick on a position other than quarterback, they still could add one at some point over the three-day draft. Based on the Steelers' predraft meetings and offseason comments from new coach Mike McCarthy and Khan, it seems likely the Steelers will draft a QB regardless of Rodgers' future or Howard's trajectory.
Through their actions and words, the Steelers have laid out a list of ideal traits they're looking for in a 2026 quarterback -- and many of them are characteristics McCarthy wanted out of quarterbacks while coaching the Green Bay Packers.
"Brett Favre and Aaron Rogers are Hall of Fame quarterbacks, but they both have long arms," McCarthy said. "They both have 10-inch hands. In the winter playoff games, to win games in December, Ben Roethlisberger is the same way. I played against him in cold weather. Your guys got to throw it better than the other guy in the big games, you hope -- or you got to try to put them in a position to.
"A lot of my beliefs and how I want to train the team and what the team looked like, it's very similar to my time at Green Bay. That directly reflects how I view the quarterbacks. That's how I've always viewed the quarterbacks."
Khan boiled it down to being a quarterback capable of having success in the Steelers' physical division.
"We have to find the right quarterback that's going to be an AFC North quarterback," Khan said. "Playing in the AFC North, there's nothing like it -- the cold weather, the rivalries, the division, the physicality of the division.
"It's got to be an AFC North quarterback."
In addition to coveting quarterbacks with long arms, big hands and cold-weather prowess, the Steelers also have expressed interest in signal-callers with a championship pedigree and a quick recall.
"The importance of immediate recall is, to me, what I'm looking for," McCarthy said of the information he gleans from his quarterback prospect meetings. "My goal when the quarterbacks come in was, let's have a conversation like if I was coaching you, and all the guys we had at the combine were all -- they're excellent. They're awesome. These kids today are well-schooled. They can speak it, and then when they put the video on and what they're saying is also on the video, now you got something."
While there isn't a prospect who checks all of those boxes in the 2026 draft, the Steelers have met with several who fulfill some of those qualities and could land with the Steelers through a Day 2 or Day 3 pick.
One intriguing option is Miami quarterback Carson Beck, whom the Steelers hosted in a top-30 predraft visit on March 17. Beck is projected to be a third-round pick in Matt Miller's latest mock draft.
Beck's 10-inch hands measured as the second largest of quarterbacks invited to the combine. He has significant postseason experience after playing in this past season's College Football Playoff National Championship game and in a playoff quarterfinal during the previous campaign. Beck, who led the nation in completion rate (72.4%) last season, threw 30 touchdowns and 12 interceptions for the Hurricanes, but he completed just 59.4% of attempts in the title game loss to Indiana while throwing one TD and one pick.
"You can't hide from production," Khan said of Beck at the combine. "So, when a guy produces -- and he's done that at a high level or at a big school -- and winning's important, so you can't deny any of that."
But with five years at Georgia before his lone season with the Canes, Beck lacks experience playing in cold weather.
Another name to watch is LSU quarterback Garrett Nussmeier. While the Steelers have yet to host Nussmeier on a predraft visit, McCarthy traveled to Baton Rouge for the signal-caller's pro day on March 23.
At 6-foot-2, Nussmeier is smaller than the other guys in the Steelers' quarterback room, but his big arm and knack for throwing on the move could make him a good fit for McCarthy's system. Plus, it doesn't hurt that McCarthy is plenty familiar with the Nussmeier family because he coached with Nussmeier's father, Gary, during his tenure with the Dallas Cowboys. Garrett Nussmeier even landed with the Steelers in the second round of Miller's seven-round mock draft.
If the Steelers want to prioritize a cold-weather quarterback, though, they could explore drafting Penn State product Drew Allar. Allar spent all four campaigns with the Nittany Lions. He also is McCarthy's ideal quarterback prototype at 6-foot-5 with 32¾ arms and hands that span nearly 10 inches. Allar, though, is coming off a season-ending broken ankle that limited him to six games during his senior season.
Other candidates the Steelers could consider are Arkansas quarterback Taylen Green and North Dakota State product Cole Payton, whom Pittsburgh hosted on March 20.
Payton, at 6-foot-3, has hands that measure 10¼ inches, and he has a 31⅝ arm span. He led the FCS in passing efficiency in 2025 and was second in completion rate with 16 TDs and four interceptions.
Green checks in a 6-foot-6 and has 9⅞" hands and a 34¾ arm span.
The quarterback of the future might not be in the first round of this year's draft, and he might not be in the next six rounds, either. But taking a lower-risk swing after the first round would help round out the room and potentially uncover a diamond-in-the-rough type of player.
"I'm hopeful there'll be a quarterback at the right time there for us to possibly add to our roster," McCarthy said at the NFL's annual meeting in Phoenix a week ago. "Twelve picks, we want to have a hell of a class."