Steelers news and commentary Tuesday, January 30th

Welcome to the Terrible Towel Tales, where we’ll highlight some of the latest stories permeating Steelers media for your reading pleasure every Monday through Saturday. In today’s news…

Steelers’ Art Rooney II: ‘We’ve had enough’ of playoff win drought | Brooke Pryor, ESPN

With the Pittsburgh Steelers’ last playoff victory having come in 2016, owner and team president Art Rooney II acknowledged Monday that there’s a growing sense of urgency to end the drought.

“We’ve had enough of this,” Rooney said. “It’s time to get some wins; it’s time to take these next steps.”

The leader for those next steps is clear, Rooney said, as he voiced his support for coach Mike Tomlin.

“The players still respond to Mike, and that’s No. 1,” Rooney said. “He still has the key characteristics that we saw when we hired him. He can keep the attention of a group of 20-year-olds for a whole season and keep them in the fight for the whole way.

Steelers Tell Mason Rudolph Offseason Plan | Noah Strackbein, All Steelers

The Pittsburgh Steelers have not hid their desire to have Mason Rudolph return in 2024 to compete for their starting quarterback job, and they’ve now had conversations with the veteran QB about their hopes to re-sign him.

During an interview on The Ramon Foster Show, Rudolph said head coach Mike Tomlin and general manager Omar Khan told him they want to re-sign him during free agency. Although the team has expressed their interest, Rudolph understands it’s too early in the process to have a clear indication of what’s going to happen.

Steelers working on “key decision” about Najee Harris’ fifth-year option | Josh Alper, NBC Sports

The 2021 first-round pick is moving into his fourth NFL season and that means it is time for the Steelers to decide whether to exercise their option on his contract for a fifth year. Harris ran for over 1,000 yards for the third straight year and posted a career-best average of 4.1 yards per carry, but Rooney would only say that the team is considering all of its options.

“A lot of thought, a lot of analysis goes into making those decisions,” Rooney said, via Tim Benz of the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review. “We’ll be working on that as well as all the other things we have to do in the offseason, but that’ll be a key decision as we get closer to the draft in May.”