The pads went on at Saint Vincent College, which means the polite phase of camp is over and the sorting has begun. Contact has a way of reorganizing depth charts that seven-on-seven never will, and the first hitting sessions of Camp McCarthy produced real information. Here is what the beat saw, with the receipts.
The first-round pick did not wait his turn
The headline development up front: Steelers Depot is already asking whether Max Iheanachor will claim a starting job after an impressive debut in pads. That is a remarkable sentence about a rookie four practices into contact work, even a 21st overall pick. We projected him as a week-one game-day active; the beat is now discussing something bigger. The offensive line room we called fifteen deep for nine or ten jobs suddenly has a very interesting top of the rotation, and veteran linemen are getting outside validation too, with Troy Fautanu and Zach Frazier ranked among the league's best by an offensive line analyst.
The Wilson file, updated honestly
Four days ago our columnist wrote that he would believe Roman Wilson's year three when he saw it, and named the evidence that would move him. We report the file as it grows, so here is this week's stack: Aaron Rodgers said Wilson is "more under control" than the deer-running-around version he saw last year. The Athletic's Mike DeFabo is "much more confident" Wilson becomes a significant contributor. Ben Roethlisberger is impressed with his camp, and Alan Saunders' padded-practice takeaways led with "Roman Wilson rising".
The column's conditions were specific: first-team slot snaps in pads, targets thrown on purpose by Rodgers, staff-schemed touches. The quarterback praising his control is not yet a target share, and camp reputations evaporate fast, but we said we would track the boxes as they got checked. Consider this box-tracking. If the preseason games extend the pattern, the follow-up column writes itself, and our columnist will take the loss with a smile.
The quarterback room, sorted by a hair
The development race behind Rodgers has its first consensus reading: beat writers polled by Steelers Depot agree Drew Allar has been marginally better than Will Howard through the first week. Marginally is doing real work in that sentence, and our read on this room stands: the January answer is being assembled in August increments.
The more interesting quarterback story is the starter's August. Mike McCarthy has ideas about his preseason plan, and PennLive reports Rodgers told McCarthy he will do something he has not done in years: play in the preseason. Ben Roethlisberger, for one, thinks he should sit. A 42-year-old volunteering for August contact is either a tone-setting gift to the locker room or an unnecessary risk to the entire season, and it is genuinely both at once. Green Bay on the 13th just got more interesting.
Around the room
DeShon Elliott opened up about the road back from the injury that ended his 2025, which pairs well with our read on his comeback. New safety Rayshawn Jenkins arrived with the best origin story in camp: the man once disrespected a Terrible Towel and has now formally apologized, which is the correct order of operations for anyone planning to play safety in this town. And Rico Dowdle told the Post-Gazette he is ready to form a "dynamic one-two punch" with Jaylen Warren, a backfield question the preseason will actually answer.
As for the other thing that happened at camp this week: the national media spent it relitigating Monday's McAfee segment, Fauci's lawyer suggested Rodgers stick to football, and Steelers Now reported the one place Rodgers is not a lightning rod is his own locker room. The team practiced through all of it. That, more than anything, is the McCarthy-era tell so far.
Nine days to Green Bay. The pads stay on.
