Pittsburgh Steelers coach Mike Tomlin hasn’t announced his intentions at quarterback publicly or inside the organization, but it’s widely believed in the front workplace that Ben Roethlisberger will rest his high ankle sprain Saturday against the St. Louis Rams and could sit out Week 17 as nicely.
Roethlisberger was clearly hobbled throughout Monday night’s 20-three loss to the San Francisco 49ers. He was immobile and had to adjust his plant foot on throws to compensate for the injury. With the Steelers assured a playoff spot and trailing the Baltimore Ravens for the AFC North title on a tiebreaker, the team will concentrate on becoming healthy for the postseason.
Charlie Batch is Roethlisberger’s backup. Offensive coordinator Bruce Arians prefers the veteran to Dennis Dixon, but other people in the organization think Dixon’s athleticism and improvisational skills make him the more viable starter. Must Batch struggle and turn out to be a sitting target behind a wounded offensive line, Dixon may well see the field.
On Tuesday, Tomlin denied wanting to sit Roethlisberger throughout Monday night’s game, contradicting the quarterback’s own account of becoming approached to come out late. Tomlin did acknowledge that the injury affected Roethlisberger’s game.
“I’m certain it did,” Tomlin told SiriusXM NFL Radio. “A lot of his game is predicated on mobility and so forth. But he wanted to give it a shot, we wanted him to give it a shot. We don’t make any excuses for what we tried to do (Monday).”
Center Maurkice Pouncey, who missed Monday night’s game, likely will sit one more week as well, according to sources.
(About:) This write-up was distributed by Syndicated Sports news wire and aggregation service, For far more NFL news see: Steelers sources: Roethlisberger might sit rest of normal season.
