Pittsburgh Steelers head coach Mike McCarthy is already seeing enough from Drew Allar to keep bringing him up at training camp in Latrobe, Pa.
Through six practices, Allar has flashed the kind of arm talent that turns heads, and McCarthy says the young Penn State quarterback is making real progress. The coach pointed to the daily growth he’s seen as Allar works through a camp full of difficult reps.
“He’s doing what you want from a young player,” McCarthy said. “These are tough practices because you’re not just repeating concepts. There hasn’t been a day where he hasn’t made a throw that makes you say, ‘Okay, that’s a young man taking a step.‘”
Allar, the Steelers’ first third round pick in the 2026 NFL Draft, has been working closely with McCarthy and quarterbacks coach Tom Arth on the basics of the offense, with a particular focus on footwork. The goal is to get him into a better rhythm so he can play faster and throw more accurately.
“It’s really just about tweaking things,” Allar said. “There’s a lot of different philosophies.
Every coach probably teaches footwork a little bit different and with Coach McCarthy, he has his beliefs. They’ve shown they work very well with who he has been around.
It’s about me buying into that and getting it as consistent as possible. With all the QBs he’s worked with, they’ve had a tremendous amount of success.
But I have to start from the ground up.”
McCarthy said the Steelers are putting Allar through the same “QB school” he runs every offseason, the same process that helped shape Aaron Rodgers into a four-time MVP at the NFL level. Now, Pittsburgh is hoping it produces the same kind of growth with Allar.
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