At 42, Aaron Rodgers enters 2026 as the NFL’s oldest active quarterback. With a one-year contract retaining him as the Steelers’ QB, he has confirmed 2026 will be his final season. Waiting for him on the sideline is a familiar face in Mike McCarthy, the 62-year-old Pittsburgh native hired to replace Mike Tomlin, and the same coach Rodgers spent 13 seasons alongside in Green Bay. They won Super Bowl XLV together. While many expect the reunion to recreate the same magic, NFL analyst Frank Schwab doesn’t believe the Steelers made the right decision by pairing them up in 2026.

“I just view Steelers as this organisation that has this proud history and has a lot of Super Bowl titles. And they are swinging for singles. They are not chasing championships anymore,” Schwab said on Yahoo Sports. “You cannot tell me that people in the building think that they’re a Super Bowl contender with the combination of Aaron Rodgers and Mike McCarthy.” 

“Aaron Rodgers, his career has mirrored Brett Favre in so many ways. Look at Brett Favre last year. Look how it went. It wasn’t pretty at all. He hit the wall hard. And I could see that happening for Aaron Rodgers.”

Critics have loved to pick on the moves the Steelers made in recent times. Signing a 62-year-old Mike McCarthy, extending an outgoing QB’s contract for upto $25 million, and arguably not having an obvious heir apparent at the position, have all led to fans questioning the championship aspirations of the franchise.

Aaron Rodgers and Brett Favre are compared constantly, every time the former’s legacy, career path, and stats are discussed. While Favre played 16 seasons with Green Bay, Rodgers played 18. Favre led the team to a Super Bowl win in the 1996 season, and Rodgers in the 2010 season. Favre has three MVP awards, and Rodgers has four.

Brett Favre’s last season in the NFL was the 2010 season, playing for the Minnesota Vikings. It was a physically grueling year for him as he threw for a career-low 2,509 yards, 11 touchdowns, and 19 interceptions across 13 games. His last career snap occurred on 20 December 2010, against the Chicago Bears, where he suffered a concussion, ending his season. 

Comparatively, Rodgers’ 2025 performance was better than Favre’s 2010, with 3,322 yards, 24 touchdowns, and seven interceptions. While the numbers look healthier on paper, the Steelers mustered just 175 yards in their wild card loss to Houston Texans. Stepping into the 2026 season, ‘can Aaron Rodgers perform at the championship level as Tom Brady did?’ is a question that constantly looms around him. 

“He [Aaron Rodgers] is a perfectly reasonable quarterback, and for his age, it was impressive. But we’re getting to an age where only Tom Brady has had success,” Frank Schwab added. “And Tom Brady is a cyborg. I’m not even sure he’s human. Like, he might literally be made in the lab. So Tom Brady’s the outlier. Let’s not compare anybody to Tom Brady.”

With the signing of Mike McCarthy, the Steelers will have a new voice leading the team for the first time in 19 years. That, combined with his 13 seasons of experience teaming up with Rodgers, the management believes this is the right move to make. However, a common criticism is that the Steelers must be looking at building for the future and not investing in short-term fixes.

“I hated that hire for the Steelers. I just thought it was a very safe, ‘we’re just playing up to the West Pennsylvania guy’ story,” said Schwab. “Go hire Jesse Minter, or go hire somebody with some upside. Klint Kubiak. I don’t know. But we know who Mike McCarthy is. Neither of these guys are floor raisers at all.”

Can 2026 actually be different for the Pittsburgh Steelers?

One of the biggest issues with the Steelers’ play in 2025 was how predictable the defense was. Despite fielding the highest-paid defensive unit in the league, the team struggled against the better offenses in the league. 

The week 7 game against the Cincinnati Bengals saw the failure of their man-coverage scheme, where wide receiver Ja’Marr Chase repeatedly exploited coverage cushions, beating high-profile defenders like Jalen Ramsey. The week 8 game against the Green Bay Packers saw multiple communication errors resulting in the Packers scoring wide-open touchdowns.

For the 2026 season, Mike McCarthy has hired Patrick Graham as the new defensive coordinator for the Steelers. During his time with the Las Vegas Raiders, Graham maintained a reputation for getting the most out of his defensive unit. With limited talent, his defensive unit put up great performances.

As far as the offense is concerned, the Pittsburgh Steelers have suffered through a prolonged drought, with the 2025 season marking their fifth consecutive year failing to finish in the top 10 in scoring. With McCarthy’s signing, it is expected that the Steelers’ offense will improve significantly.

Mike McCarthy has a proven track record of directing some of the most dominant scoring attacks in modern NFL history. Over his tenure as the head coach in Dallas and Green Bay, his offense has finished 12 times in the top 10, and four times as the season’s best.  

The Steelers won the AFC North last season, and this time, they are arguably in a much better position. Not to forget, Aaron Rodgers and Mike McCarthy understand each other’s working styles, strengths, and weaknesses very well. But is this sufficient for them to beat the likes of Bengals and Ravens? While the answer to that question lies in what the team manages to produce on the field starting week 1, what is certain is that the Steelers may likely just be equipped better in 2026 than they were last year.