Pittsburgh Steelers quarterback Ben Roethlisberger missed most of last season after suffering an elbow injury in the second week of the season, which led to him sitting out the remainder of the year. On Friday, Roethlisberger met with doctors in Los Angeles and was cleared to resume throwing the ball for the first time since his injury.

“It was a good report,” Roethlisberger said. “I got to bypass the tennis ball throwing for a month and go right to the football. Still going to be about 2.5-3 months until I get total clearance from doc but we are doing good!”

“It felt amazing to throw,” Roethlisberger said. “It was hard to hold the smile in. Two more throwing sessions while I’m out here in California and then headed back to the ‘Burgh.”

Prior to his trip to the doctors, Steelers head coach Mike Tomlin said he had “no hesitation” that Roethlisberger would be ready to go by the season.

Good News For Steelers With Ben Roethlisberger Back

“This guy is the ultimate competitor,” Tomlin said. “He’s dropped the gauntlet down, he’s made a statement that he’s coming back — and I look forward to watching him answer that challenge.”

General manager Kevin Colbert also shared the same sentiment.

“We’re just really focused on where Ben is at this point,” Colbert told local media recently. “Unfortunately, he had a season-ending injury that we think he can and will recover from moving forward. It’s just a wait-and-see.”

“He had an injury to his right arm, but other than that, he’s relatively healthy. We’re not minimizing the right arm injury to a right arm quarterback, but we don’t think he’s at the end of the road.”

On Saturday, the Steelers posted a five-second clip on Twitter of their franchise QB lightly throwing a football in a gym, five months after he had his right elbow operated on.