Steelers Sign Both Leftwich and Culpepper? Looking to Add Steve Young Next?

If Pro Football Talk's report is accurate, the Steelers couldn't decide between Byron Leftwitch and Daunte Culpepper, so they signed them both. (Update: The PFT story now says that a league source says they will add, but the Sporting News story based on PFT's report--Mike Florio works for both sites--still says that they have signed both).

Talk about your baffling decisions, especially for the two veteran quarterbacks. Both of them entered the offseason hoping to land a starting job. Now they'll be facing off for one spot as a backup. What it means is that one of them will be released when the preseason ends, which is not a great endorsement when they're trying to find that next job. And while no terms are mentioned, neither of them could have gotten much money, since the Steelers don't have a whole lot of cap room.

But it does seem to signify that the Steelers are more concerned about Charlie Batch's injury that it would have appeared at first report on Friday night. If Batch is back in four-to-six weeks as Mike Tomlin said, the Steelers just spent a decent amount of money for a veteran backup for just a couple of games.Here's where things get interesting. Back in 2002, the Steelers lucked into signing Batch (coming off of a starting job with the Lions), and then managed to get Batch to accept the third-string job in Pittsburgh. Batch actually didn't earn the backup job until midway through the Super Bowl season of 2005, but he's proven to be one of the best backups in the league. He's also going into the final year of his current deal, so Pittsburgh could have a need to starting planning for Batch's replacement if he wants to test the market. So this would seem to be a chance to try to land a new well-qualified backup.

But with rookie Dennis Dixon looking pretty promising in the preseason opener, the Steelers could be faced with a difficult decision. If they go with Leftwich or Culpepper as the backup, they'll have someone to cut when Batch returns to health. Barring an outstanding preseason that changes some minds, the guy heading to the waiver wire when Batch gets back to health could be the winner of the Culpepper/Leftwich battle.