No matter how you slice it, QB Kenny Pickett is one of the most consequential Steelers draft picks in decades. Any time you draft a quarterback in the first round, it\u2019s a massive, massive deal. When they drafted Ben Roethlisberger in 2004, it proved wildly successful.<\/p>\n
Pickett in the first round in 2022? Not so much. In fact, he is already on his third team going into 2025. Ostensibly, he will have a chance to compete to start<\/a> after sitting on the bench in Philadelphia last year. And if he does, he could play against the Steelers\u2014not once, but twice.<\/p>\n The Browns acquired Kenny Pickett via trade this offseason, and are reportedly \u201creally, really high<\/a>\u201d on him. They may have been really, really high when they made that trade, though, because they didn\u2019t even realize<\/a> they had to decide whether or not to pick up his fifth-year option.<\/p>\n Either way, Kenny Pickett will return to the Steelers\u2019 Acrisure Stadium this year. And that got Roethlisberger to wondering: how will the fans react? \u201cIf Kenny comes in, does he get booed or cheered?\u201d, he asked on his Footbahlin podcast<\/a>. \u201cI think cheered\u201d.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n I don\u2019t think there is an all-or-nothing answer to this question. There are a lot of Steelers fans who are more than done with Kenny Pickett. On the other hand, there is a vocal contingent\u2014likely consisting largely of Pitt fans\u2014who believe the Steelers mismanaged Pickett\u2019s career and moved on from him prematurely.<\/p>\n There\u2019s more to it than that, but I digress. My point is I don\u2019t think Steelers fans would have anything resembling a universal response to seeing Kenny Pickett line up as a Browns quarterback. A lot of fans would boo, I\u2019m sure, and a lot might also cheer. Well, perhaps not necessarily cheer, but acknowledge him in some way favorably.<\/p>\n Fans take rivalries seriously, though, and often don\u2019t take kindly to players who switch allegiances. The Steelers have a couple of former Ravens at linebacker, for example, most notably Patrick Queen. Suffice it to say the Steelers didn\u2019t envision Kenny Pickett in a Browns jersey by 2025.<\/p>\n But if Pickett does start, he will have had to prove himself. He is in the middle of a four-way quarterback competition, which includes 2023 Browns folk hero Joe Flacco. They also drafted two quarterbacks, Dillon Gabriel and Shedeur Sanders. And, don\u2019t look now, but Deshaun Watson may be creeping up from the rear.<\/a><\/p>\n If you were in the stadium when the Steelers host the Browns this year and Kenny Pickett entered the game, how would you react? Would you boo, or would you cheer, if you have any reaction at all?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"No matter how you slice it, QB Kenny Pickett is one of the most consequential Steelers draft picks…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":73449,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2026],"tags":[6594,12193,7,570,57,691],"class_list":{"0":"post-73448","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-football","8":"tag-ben-roethlisberger","9":"tag-footbahlin","10":"tag-football","11":"tag-kenny-pickett","12":"tag-pittsburgh-steelers","13":"tag-trending"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/114558460451526538","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73448","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=73448"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73448\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/73449"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=73448"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=73448"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=73448"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}