The Pittsburgh Steelers need more production from wide receiver George Pickens. In the Week 5 loss to the Dallas Cowboys, Pickens registered a season-low 26 receiving yards.
According to former Steelers offensive lineman Max Starks, the Steelers need more maturity from Pickens as well.
“I need wide receivers to stop thinking they’re bigger than the game itself,” Starks said on the SNR postgame show with Mike Prisuta and Charlie Batch. “And putting personal statements on your eye black. And then the emotional moments that you go through on the sidelines is not team building. It’s not camaraderie.
“And some guys need to grow up faster than they are. And in this situation, if you wanna be a number one receiver, act like a number one receiver. Don’t act like a number three receiver in those moments. Don’t shrink in the moment you want the ball.
“He needs to grow up, and he needs to show me on the field.
Starks started for the Steelers when they won the Super Bowl after the 2005 and 2008 seasons. He was also teammates with wide receiver Hines Ward for eight seasons. Ward is regarded as one of the least selfish wideouts in Pittsburgh history.
Before the final play versus the Cowboys, which was a desperation lateral, Pickens had only 1 catch for 13 yards in the second half during Week 5.
Drama From George Pickens Against Cowboys
The night started on a very weird note for Pickens. During the Sunday night matchup with Dallas, Pickens caused a stir on social media for a message he had on his eye black.
“Steelers WR George Pickens is not playing around,” MLFootball’s X account wrote as a caption to a photo of Pickens’ eye black.
From there, the night just went south for Pickens. After the final play of the game, Pickens tackled Cowboys defensive back Jourdan Lewis by the face mask. Then, head coach Mike Tomlin had to explain to reporters why Pickens didn’t play as many offensive snaps in the game as he normally does.
“We just wanted to kind of minimize his reps in an effort to get more productivity,” Tomlin told reporters in his postgame press conference.
“We’re just trying to rep manage in terms of the totality of the big picture. [Pickens] wasn’t less of a focal point in terms of our intentions of what we wanted to do offensively, but we did want to cut his reps a little bit in an effort to get higher-quality play.”
Tomlin insisted there wasn’t an “underlying story” with Pickens’ snap usage. But the less playing time on top of only 26 receiving yards, his eye black, and face mask tackle, it seemed to be a very eventful night with plenty of storylines for Pickens.
Steelers Max Starks Puts George Pickens on Blast
Pittsburgh’s receiving problems goes beyond Pickens. The team has very little production behind him on the wideout depth chart, which is causing opposing defenses to focus all of their attention on Pickens.
Even still, he leads the team with 310 receiving yards.
But Pickens had opportunities to make a bigger impact in a close loss to the Cowboys, and he didn’t.
That “quality” Pickens displayed in his route running during the Cowboys matchup likely explains why he only played 59% of the team’s offensive snaps in Week 5. Pickens had played at least 74% of his team’s offensive snaps in the prior three contests.
That was also another reason why Starks continued to criticize Pickens on the SNR postgame show.
“You say you’re always open,” said Starks. “Show me what you get when you are open. Let balls hit your hands. Do something about it.
“Don’t sit there and pout about it. Go block somebody downfield and maybe you get to play-action on the next one. That’s a big play. Those are the things that take away from a team when you’re not a part of the team, when it’s more me than we in the process.”
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