It’s fitting that on a night when they honor the Super Bowl IX championship team, the Pittsburgh Steelers find themselves embroiled in a controversial quarterback switch.

Fifty years ago, at this precise point of the season, the Steelers famously swapped quarterbacks, a move that despite a couple hiccups put the team on a path toward its most sustained run of excellence in franchise history.

Had Chuck Noll not replaced Joe Gilliam with Terry Bradshaw in the seventh game of the 1974 season, perhaps the Steelers wouldn’t have won four Super Bowls in a six-season span.

Time will tell if Mike Tomlin’s anticipated decision to swap Justin Fields for Russell Wilson on Sunday against the New York Jets will help produce the modest goal of ending a drought of playoff wins that dates to the 2016 season.

“It will be interesting to see how it develops,” said Rocky Bleier, a running back on those 1970s Super Steelers.

Bleier, who will attend the reunion ceremony Sunday at Acrisure Stadium, will watch intently. Bradshaw already has stated publicly he believes Fields should keep his starting job after guiding the Steelers to a 4-2 start.

“Your first thought is to wonder why this is taking place,” Bleier said earlier this week. “I don’t think either one of those losses was his fault, but part of what I hear and understand is the passing game downfield needs to be developed more. They are looking for that.”

In 1974, the issue was Noll sought consistent play from the quarterback position even though the Steelers were 4-1-1 when he replaced Gilliam with Bradshaw. What’s more, they had won three in a row before Gilliam was benched.

But in his final start, Gilliam completed just 5 of 18 passes for 78 yards. He also was battling some off-the-field issues that contributed to his downfall.

“It was his drug use, basically,” Bleier said. “What evolved was he would be coming late to meetings and late to practice, and Chuck wouldn’t let that happen.”

Gilliam had earned the starting job in training camp partially because the other two quarterbacks — Bradshaw and Terry Hanratty — had honored the player strike that took place that summer.

Bradshaw was rusty when he replaced Gilliam in Week 7, completing 9 of 21 passes for 130 yards, no touchdowns and two interceptions. Still, it was good enough for the Steelers to beat Atlanta for their fourth consecutive win.

Bradshaw threw his first touchdown pass the following week in a 27-0 shutout of Philadelphia, but he completed just 13 of 35 passes for 140 yards, no touchdowns and an interception in a 17-10 loss at Cincinnati.

Noll made another switch and started Hanratty the following week at Cleveland. The Steelers won in spite of Hanratty, who completed 2 of 15 passes for 63 yards and was replaced briefly by Gilliam.

“Bradshaw comes in, and he stinks,” Bleier said. “He’s benched, and Hanratty comes in and doesn’t do any better, so he’s benched. Bradshaw comes back in and things start to fall in place the rest of the season.”

Bradshaw started the final four games, and the Steelers finished with a 10-3-1 record before beating Buffalo and Oakland in the AFC playoffs. The season was capped with a 16-6 victory against Minnesota in the Super Bowl.

Whereas Bradshaw quarterbacked the Steelers to three more championships, became a two-time Super Bowl MVP and was voted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame, Gilliam never started another game and didn’t play in the NFL after 1975. He died of a cocaine overdose in 2000 just four days shy of his 50th birthday.

“Joe had command, he was in charge and there was no hesitation,” Bleier said. “He probably had one of the quickest releases in our quarterback system. He had the talent but who would know that beneath it, he had an insecurity about his ability to play.”

In the ensuing years, the Steelers have had their share of quarterback controversies, none of which produced the same results as what took place in 1974.

A sampling:

• In 1984, the Steelers traded for David Woodley, who played in the Super Bowl two years earlier but lost his starting job the following year to rookie Dan Marino. The Steelers went 3-4 behind Woodley, who had suffered multiple concussions and bruised ribs. With the Steelers on a two-game losing streak, Noll turned to Mark Malone, who remained the starter into the playoffs as the Steelers upset Denver before losing at Miami in the AFC championship game.

• In 1992, Bill Cowher’s first season as coach, Neil O’Donnell was 9-3 as a starter but fractured his shin and missed the final three games of the season. Bubby Brister went 1-2 down the stretch and played well in the season finale. Cowher, however, turned back to O’Donnell in the AFC divisional round. O’Donnell had a hand in four turnovers and was 15 of 29 for 163 yards in a 24-3 home loss to Buffalo.

• In 2000, the Steelers signed Kent Graham to be Kordell Stewart’s backup. Although Stewart had been the Steelers’ starter for most of the previous three years, Cowher went with Graham to open the season. Graham lost his first three starts, prompting a switch to Stewart. Graham returned and won back-to-back games, and Cowher eventually went back to Stewart, who went 7-4 as a starter. Despite the Steelers winning their final two games, they fell short of the playoffs with a 9-7 record.

• In 2002, with the Steelers off to a 1-2 start and coming off an AFC championship game appearance, Stewart was benched in favor of Tommy Maddox, who hadn’t attempted an NFL pass since 1995. Maddox got the Steelers back on track but was removed on a stretcher after taking a scary hit in Tennessee. He returned and started the final four games. The Steelers won their final three and had a memorable comeback against Cleveland to open the playoffs before losing in the divisional round in a return trip to Tennessee.

• In 2019, with Ben Roethlisberger out for the season with an elbow injury, the Steelers played the final 14 games with Mason Rudolph and Devlin “Duck” Hodges at quarterback. They helped the Steelers win seven times in an eight-game span before the Cinderella story devolved into a three-game season-ending losing streak and an 8-8 record.

• In 2022, when the Jets last visited Acrisure Stadium, Tomlin benched starter Mitch Trubisky at halftime and put the outcome in the hands of rookie first-rounder Kenny Pickett. Aided by a Pickett interception, the Jets rallied for two touchdowns in the fourth quarter for a 24-20 victory. Pickett started all but one game the rest of the year. The Steelers finished with a four-game winning streak but missed the playoffs with a 9-8 record.

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