Ryan Clark no longer plays for Mike Tomlin, but if he did ... he's making it clear he'd tell the Steelers head coach he needs to officially name Justin Fields the starting quarterback ASAP.
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00:00Welcome back to TMZ Sports, Mike and Mojo.
00:08Mojo, the Pittsburgh Steelers have gotten off to a great start, 3-0, behind Justin Fields.
00:16Justin Fields, the young quarterback who, of course, came over from the Chicago Bears
00:21and who a lot of people, most people, Mojo, thought would be sitting behind Russell Wilson.
00:27But Russell has been hurt. He's got a calf injury, a nagging calf injury that has not gone away.
00:32And Justin Fields has, again, he's got the team purring at 3-0.
00:38But Mike Tomlin, the Steelers' longtime head coach, has been hesitant, Mojo, he's been resistant
00:45about naming Justin the starting quarterback, instead sort of leaving it up in the air.
00:51Well, there is a former Steelers star, Ryan Clark, who played eight seasons with the Pittsburgh Steelers,
01:00knows a little bit about winning there, won a Super Bowl in the Steel City.
01:04He doesn't agree, Mojo, with his former head coach.
01:07As a matter of fact, we had a opportunity to speak with the former DB this week,
01:13and he thinks that Tomlin needs to say Justin Fields is the starter.
01:19I believe he's earned it. I believe he's earned that confidence within the locker room.
01:23And I think there's something that goes with that title.
01:27There's something about knowing who your guy is, you know?
01:31Like, I love the fact that every week, I knew we were going to line up with Ben Roethlisberger.
01:35And if he threw an interception or if it went bad, that he was our guy and we were sticking with him.
01:40You know, sort of having that ambiguity, just that ambiguity, I can't think of the word, that word.
01:48Sort of having that indecision and not necessarily knowing that it's going to be
01:53Justin Fields the rest of the season or it could be Russell Wilson.
01:57I think that's a little difficult.
01:59But the beauty in it is Justin's handling it well, right?
02:03Justin's playing the best ball we've seen him play.
02:06Justin is continuing to get more confident.
02:09And I think that's an important piece of his journey in Pittsburgh.
02:13What do you make of that, Mojo?
02:14Is there something to knowing that good or bad, great play or not so great play,
02:19that this is our guy and he's going to be our guy going forward?
02:23Here's what I think, Babcock.
02:25Here's what I think the Pittsburgh Steelers need to do.
02:27And I think every week, they need to not name Justin Fields the starter,
02:33but internally in their coaching meetings, acknowledge that he is going to be their guy
02:38moving forward because whatever they're doing right now is working.
02:43So what is the point of straying away from that?
02:46But, but I do agree with them.
02:48You're three and Oh, right now you are the hot team and you got the hot hand.
02:53So why would you not stick with that?
02:56Right.
02:56I feel like that makes a lot of sense.
02:57You look at Russell Wilson.
02:59I mean, obviously this is a guy they paid a lot of money to, but this is also that had
03:04a really rough couple of years.
03:05Just not just last season with the Denver Broncos.
03:09And we saw what happened over there.
03:11I mean, granted not taking too much away from Russell here.
03:14I mean, he's had overall a great career, but recently he has struggled a ton.
03:19Whereas Justin Fields, he's been getting it done, putting in the cold guy right now.
03:25That's coming off of injury.
03:26That probably isn't 100%.
03:29Doesn't make a ton of sense to me.
03:32I mean, you're obviously going to revisit your coaching decisions every single week,
03:36but I say for now, leave Justin Fields where he is, let him keep doing his thing.
03:41If his play suffers, if the team starts losing, then you go ahead and plug Russ in.
03:46But until then, I don't think you make any premature decisions.
03:50I agree with you, Mojo.
03:51And I think if we were to get into the heads of Mike Tomlin and the Steelers brass, I've
03:56got to believe if they could have picked one quarterback to really have a great start here.
04:01Russ is 35.
04:02He's not the long-term answer.
04:04Justin Fields is 25 years old and he's got a ton of physical talent.
04:09So if he's coming into his own now, a lot of people think the Bears moved on from him
04:13prematurely and they've got a guy who is one of the hottest prospects we've seen in the
04:16last decade.
04:17So I get it with Caleb Williams.
04:19But look, if you've got a 25-year-old who could be your quarterback for the next 10
04:23years, yeah, ride the hot hat.