Pittsburgh Steelers had interest in Raiders’ QB Terrelle Pryor
By Matt Shetler
The Pittsburgh Steelers will get a up close and personal look at Oakland Raiders quarterback Terrelle Pryor on Sunday when the Steelers visit the Oakland Raiders.
While the Steelers defense will be busy trying to contain the mobile Pryor and come away with their third win, Pryor trying to add to the list of Western Pennsylvania quarterbacks to torment the Steelers.
Oct 13, 2013; Kansas City, MO, USA; Oakland Raiders quarterback Terrelle Pryor (2) warms up before the game against the Kansas City Chiefs at Arrowhead Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Denny Medley-USA TODAY Sports
It will be an interesting matchup considering Pryor nearly became a Steeler.
After becoming a high school star at Jeannette High School, Pryor went onto Ohio State where his collegiate career ended in controversy before ending up hooking on with the Raiders.
How close was prior to being a Steeler?
Closer than you may think.
Even though the Steelers have a franchise signal caller in place inn Ben Roethlisberger, they appeared to be pretty serious about going after Pryor.
"“Mike said, ‘Hey, I’ll draft you if you want to play here,’ ” Pryor told ESPN’s Scott Brown. “But he gave me a story about when he was in Tampa Bay about a quarterback and he ended up being in the same hometown as the NFL team and it was just hard for him because of all the distractions around him.“I don’t know what the guys up top were thinking and whether they wanted to take me or not. [Tomlin] gave me an opportunity to say if I wanted to [play for the Steelers] or not and I ended up saying no because at a young age I didn’t want to be near home and have distractions around me.”"
It probably was the right choice for Pryor.
At best he would have just been serving as a backup to Roethlisberger and there would have been many distractions in Pittsburgh for the young man.
In Oakland he has gotten the chance to start and while he has experienced some growing pains and hasn’t exactly shown that he is a quarterback the Raiders can build around, his career is a lot further along in black and silver than it likely would have been had he been wearing black and gold.
Once Pryor made his intentions clear that he didn’t want to be in Pittsburgh, Steelers head coach Mike Tomlin left him a message, one that should be fresh in his mind when the two teams hook up on Sunday.
“He said ‘When the time comes and we play you I’m coming after you, I’m blitzing you,’ ” Pryor said.
We will find out Sunday if Pryor can handle the pressure.