PITTSBURGH — By sending George Pickens to the Dallas Cowboys earlier this week, the Steelers assured that yet one more broad receiver drafted by the group will not see a second contract in Pittsburgh.
Of 16 extension-eligible broad receivers drafted by the group since 2007, three have obtained second contracts. 5 performed out their four-year offers and departed in free company. Two have been traded throughout their rookie offers. 4 have been minimize earlier than ending these offers and one was signed off the Steelers’ apply squad to a different group’s lively roster.
Although the group has a status of efficiently drafting and creating its broad receivers, the Steelers’ latest historical past displays the leaguewide challenges that include evaluating the place and cultivating homegrown expertise.
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The primary predicament groups face is sifting via the sheer quantity of gamers on the place, one expertise evaluator advised ESPN. Thanks partly to pass-heavy offenses and a shortage of elite cornerback play in school soccer, every draft class has a wealth of broad receivers with large numbers. These school offenses typically require receivers to run far fewer routes than they might within the NFL, that means there’s extra guesswork concerned in figuring out a large receiver’s NFL potential.
“It is a true projection,” the evaluator mentioned.
Although most of their receivers did not get second contracts, the Steelers had a stretch of success from 2009-10 in figuring out and drafting Mike Wallace, Emmanuel Sanders and Antonio Brown. However in lots of circumstances, groups throughout the league wrestle to hit on broad receivers. And because the haystack across the needle grows thicker with every draft class, bringing in a veteran through commerce is a most popular roster-building technique.
The Steelers did simply that this offseason by buying DK Metcalf in a commerce from Seattle and forgoing a large receiver within the draft. The group additionally signed veteran Robert Woods to a one-year deal, persevering with a latest development of rounding out its receiving corps with older gamers like Allen Robinson and Van Jefferson.
And after bringing in a identified performer in Metcalf — and subsequently signing him to a four-year, $132 million contract extension — the door opened to lastly transfer on from Pickens.
Pickens is the sixth receiver within the Mike Tomlin period to be drafted by Pittsburgh and ultimately traded to a different group. 5 of these gamers — Pickens, Diontae Johnson, Chase Claypool, Martavis Bryant and Brown — have been dealt partly due to issues involving their conduct. The commerce that despatched Sammie Coates, a 2015 third-round choose, to the Cleveland Browns was extra about his harm historical past and roster match. However common supervisor Omar Khan mentioned the sample of trades is not going to influence how the group builds its receiver depth.
“A few of that is simply actually coincidence the way it’s performed out with the place. We’re all the time making an attempt to get good gamers no matter what place it is at and at any level within the yr,” Khan mentioned.
“We’re chasing a championship, and each choice we make is predicated on making an attempt to win a championship not solely sooner or later however this yr.”
Even earlier than buying and selling Pickens, Steelers proprietor Artwork Rooney II was requested in his end-of-season information convention if the sample of troubling conduct from Steelers broad receivers may influence how the group evaluates the place.
“I feel each group appears to have one or two guys in that room that you need to handle them accurately,” Rooney mentioned in January. “I nonetheless suppose George has sufficient expertise that we have got to attempt to work and see if we are able to get him to satisfy the expertise that he actually has. Who is aware of if we are able to get there? We’ll see. However when you may have guys which are as proficient as among the guys you are in all probability pondering of, you attempt to work with them and have them aid you achieve success.”
However previously 5 months, the Steelers reached the identical willpower with Pickens that they beforehand reached with Brown, Johnson, Bryant and Claypool.
Whereas it is unclear if the Steelers noticed warning indicators of doubtless disruptive conduct of their predraft evaluations of the 4 beforehand traded broad receivers, Pickens had a number of crimson flags. He was ejected for combating in a recreation towards Georgia Tech in 2019, and in consequence was suspended for the primary half of the SEC championship recreation towards LSU. At the very least one NFL group took him off their draft board after being turned off by his conduct throughout his predraft go to, in response to a high-ranking group government.
The Steelers, although, dismissed any character issues.
“I do not even perceive the place that is coming from,” Tomlin mentioned in October 2022 when requested about Pickens’ enjoying fashion deterring different groups within the predraft course of. “This man is doing all the pieces that we ask him to. He is enjoying good ball. Lots of people have incidents of their school background. I am definitely not going to carry that towards him. We did our due diligence. We have been utterly snug together with his character. He has displayed that since he is been right here. So, I considerably resent that.”
And but, these incidents continued via his skilled profession. Outbursts at teammates and throwing his helmet on the sideline. Grabbing one other participant by his face masks and yanking him down after the sport. Combating with one other participant throughout an onside kick return. Combating with a special participant throughout a Hail Mary try.
For as proficient as Pickens is, the noise round all the pieces else that comes with him appeared to succeed in a crescendo for the Steelers.
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“I can not actually change anybody’s opinion,” Pickens mentioned of out of doors perceptions throughout his introductory information convention name in Dallas. “Me, personally, I simply proceed to develop. I really feel like all people on this planet has to develop. You become old and older as you develop, and I am simply making an attempt to construct a successful tradition, which they have already got on the Cowboys. I am simply glad to be becoming a member of it.”
Although Pickens may nonetheless change the narrative relying on the result of his Steelers profession, latest historical past suggests the Steelers are profitable at timing these selections.
Previous to Pickens, the group’s two earlier trades involving drafted broad receivers despatched Johnson to the Carolina Panthers for cornerback Donte Jackson and a picks swap, whereas Claypool went to Chicago for a No. 32 choose the Steelers used to take CB Joey Porter Jr. Claypool, as soon as a second-round choose, managed simply 217 whole receiving yards with the Bears and Miami Dolphins. He wasn’t on a roster in 2024.
Johnson, in the meantime, had 375 mixed receiving yards as he pinballed across the league in tumultuous stints with the Carolina Panthers, Baltimore Ravens and Houston Texans.
And maybe essentially the most notable well-timed commerce by the Steelers was the transfer to ship Brown to the Raiders after the 2018 season.
The Steelers gained three divisional titles and three playoff video games from 2014 to 2018 thanks largely to Brown’s consecutive 1,000-yard seasons. However an escalation of the broad receiver’s actions in the course of the 2018 season — skipping practices, blowing up at teammates and getting right into a social media altercation with a group worker — led to the group dealing him within the offseason.
Although Brown gained a Tremendous Bowl as a member of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers after leaving Pittsburgh, his remaining years within the NFL have been punctuated by much more drama. He completed with simply 1,084 yards over three years after posting six consecutive seasons of no less than 1,000 yards.
Within the timing of the commerce and its aftermath, the Steelers appeared to maximise Brown’s expertise whereas minimizing his unfavourable traits.
Buying and selling away one of many group’s finest offensive playmakers — particularly after the NFL draft — with seemingly restricted choices to backfill the WR2 place is dangerous. But it surely’s simply as dangerous to maintain a participant who incurred pricey on-field penalties, confirmed up late to video games, threatened to combat a fan in a social media remark and wrote an specific message on his eye black for a prime-time recreation.
If the Steelers’ prior expertise is any indication, it “made sense for everybody.”
