Why Russ to judgment? Bo Nix beat the Jets at East Rutherford. In a monsoon. When Gang Green still had a pulse.
Yeah, yeah. You saw Sunday Night Football. You saw Russell Wilson chuck it like Denver never happened, which is exactly how Big Russ hopes the Pro Football Hall of Fame selectors treat 2022-2023. You saw Wilson light up the M-E-S-S, mess, mess, mess for 37 points, 264 passing yards and two touchdowns and wondered what coulda been … if he’d stayed.
Although we already know, don’t we? Russ and Sean Payton were one too many old alpha dogs in the same kennel. Sure, it might’ve worked, if one side had been willing to swallow a bit of pride. Payton preferred to swallow $85 million in dead-cap alimony and shop for a younger model.
Actually, you know what it would’ve looked like? A lot like how the 2-5 Jets look now.
The mother of all hot messes. Whispers. Demotions. Grumblings. Impromptu news conferences after practices and at locker stalls. A new twist in the soap opera every other day.
A Sean-Russ divorce was inevitable, on several fronts. Wilson is an improv specialist, a jazz odyssey in cleats. Payton is a stickler for the system, the script and structure. The playsheet, a mess of yellow highlighter and hand-written hope, is gospel. Russ, at his best, was pure sacrilege.
Yeah, Wilson lit up New York. So? Gang Green might be the biggest dumpster fire east of Cleveland right now, having fired coach Robert Salah and demoted old pal Nathaniel Hackett. The J-E-T-S are stuck with an interim coach and interim offensive coordinator trying to squeeze whatever’s left out of Aaron Rodgers, a QB1 who turns 41 in December.
Time will tell if Payton made the right choice. But anything sunny that happened with Sean and Russ under one roof in 2024 would’ve been a happy accident.
Also, comparing Nix after seven NFL starts to Wilson after 189 of them isn’t just unfair. It’s asinine.
Context matters. Our man Bo in Week 7 found himself throwing to Devaughn Vele (NFL TDs since 2021: 0), Troy Franklin (one TD) and Courtland Sutton (16 TDs) as his starting options.
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If you’re keeping score at home, that’s a seventh-round rookie, a fourth-round rookie and a veteran.
Wilson in Week 7 made his Steelers debut throwing to Van Jefferson (career NFL TDs since 2021: 10), George Pickens (10 TDs) and tight ends Pat Freiermuth (13 TDs) and Darnell Washington (one TD).
That’s three second-round picks and a third-round selection. Two of those studs — Pickens and Washington — were members of the ’22 Georgia Bulldogs who went 15-0 and pulverized Alabama in the CFP championship game.
In seven NFL games, Nix has already played in three in which he wasn’t sacked. He’s 3-0 in those contests. And all of them were road wins — at the Bucs, at the Jets and at the Saints.
With Wilson’s resume, you have to go back 49 NFL games, to the pandemic season of 2020, before you can add up three games in which he wasn’t sacked.
Big Russ has been sacked at least once in 35 straight starts — a run that started in Week 14 of the 2021 season and continued until his Pittsburgh debut. Wilson’s 14-21 in those appearances.
And you miss him? Seriously?
There are trade-offs. Pittsburgh completed five “explosion” throws of 20 yards or more with Wilson, while the Broncos landed three in New Orleans with Nix.
Broncos Country is waiting for No. 10 to give them a “wow” passing moment — in a good way, not the missing-two-open-targets-on-the-same-play kind of wow.
Pick your poison. The elusive youngster, a station-to-station dude with the iffy throwing mechanics whose feet never stop being happy? Or the old slinger who connects on the occasional rainbow from 35 yards out while he’s staring at third-and-25?
Payton made his choice.
With Wilson, the Steelers faced five third-and-8-or-more situations vs. the Jets. With Nix behind center in New Orleans, on the road, indoors, in one of the loudest home venues in the NFL, the Broncos dealt with only three.
Just because “game management” has become a pejorative term in a passing league doesn’t make it any less of a skill. Nix has already flashed that in bunches, even when he can’t hear himself think.
As for the footwork thing, well …
“I think you have to be careful you’re not over-coaching,” Payton said during his weekly conference call Monday. “There are some things he does very well out of the pocket or climbing up in the pocket.
“I think we start with the focus on timing of the route, the depth of the route in the gun or under center … the times where he’s climbing the pocket or moving in the pocket, we’re pretty smart about how much we saw. Or how much we try to fix.”
Nix, for all the ups and downs, is a work in progress. A relatively blank canvas with yards and years to fill.
The Steelers bought Wilson as-is. Or as-was. Pining for a 35-year-old who can’t see the middle of the field isn’t just revisionist history. It’s DangerRuss.
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