Pickens over DK this week.

Oh, I don't mind seeing Pickens play well. He was always going to perform when put in an offense that throws the ball all over the field. Great player. Still having a lot of the issues he had here with his personality.... I think we've had all the emotions play out on this one lol not sure why its still a topic of discussion this late in the season.

 

Who cares get over it he was a cancer, all of the other players can show up on time but according to you if Pickens is frequently late it's okay he's a talent .

 

Pickens numbers wouldn't be close to what he is doing in Dallas. He had three years to grow up the penalties, tardiness, and running his routes half assed sometimes.

 

That's my point. The offense was already good. Now the offense is dangerous. The defense sucked.

 

Scribe, Brice, and Mashburn when it comes to Pickens

 

I agree his numbers wouldn’t be as good here in this Junior Varsity offensive scheme we run.

 

It is a part of the narrative of this season. That is one reason. It is absolutely relevant to the Steelers current situation.

Sunday illustrated the problem perfectly. Rudolph was dropping back and not finding people open. Also, almost all of his passes down the field were 50-50 balls to the sideline. None had any chance of being completed and one was intercepted. Pickens very likely would have caught at least one of those. The lack of a second receiver has plagued the offense all season. That was on display Sunday.

To make matters worse, most of us had the opportunity to watch Pickens dominate against the Cowboys. Among NFL wide receivers, only Jaxon Smith-Njigba is having a better season than Pickens.

This wasn't bad luck. This was a failure by Tomlin and his staff when Pickens was in Pittsburgh, and a failure by whoever decided they had to trade him. Given the limited return, it was clear they didn't get some irresistible offer. They wanted him gone, which ha turned out to be an incredibly stupid decision.

All of that is relevant to current discussions of the team as it relates to the future of both Tomlin and Khan.

So can we please stop with this nonsensical argument that we shouldn't be talking about Pickens any more? We should. If you don't like it, don't click the thread.

 

Nope, but that offense would be a hell of a lot better with him in it. Rodgers would love a guy who runs slants as well as Pickens runs them. Rudolph worked well with Pickens in 2023. He would have made a huge difference in the 2025 Steelers' offense.

 

Jimmy Johnson had two sets of rules. One for his stars and one for everyone else. That approach put him in the Hall of Fame and made the Cowboys a dynasty in the '90s. You figure it out and let the elite player be an elite player. The Cowboys are managing to do it with Brian Schottenheimer. Is he some sort of coaching genius?

I'm sorry you don't like having the Steelers' stupidity laid bare for you. Stick your head in the sand if you like, but this is something we should be discussing. It is an organizational failure that will likely end up being the difference between the Steelers being a dangerous playoff team and missing them entirely.

 

His numbers would be down from what he actually has this year.

But our passing game would be so much better with both Pickens and DK.

Not only that, Pickens being an elite (or close to it) contested ball guy means he was a better fit for our "not allowed to have more than one play maker on offense" roster construction strategy.

I think that DK is currently on pace for fewer yards than GP had last year when he missed 3 games due to injury.

And we have better QB play this year too.

GP was the right player for this kind of offense IMO. Because our lead (and only) WR is going to get blanketed all the time. Tomlin's super power is supposed to be these player relationship things. Would have been better for us to deal with him for one more year and actually have a passing offense IMO.

 

And you're assuming Rodgers would work well with a player who doesn't hustle all the time on the field .

 

I wanted to see what the offense would look like with Pickens and Metcalf too, but as fans we need to move on I don't think keeping Pickens makes the Steelers a Super Bowl team.

 

Untenable situation- One that cannot be defended, justified, or sustained any longer because it is unworkable or insupportable. I have heard this reported by many members of the local media maybe Khan and Art ll wanted him gone too.

 

I 100% agree that we're not one player away from a SB.

But that argument doesn't really work here IMO.

We're not a 2026 3rd round (and a pick swap in 2027) away from a SB. So why trade Pickens?

It didn't have to be keeping Pickens. But going into a 2nd season in a row with zero plan for WR2 is kind of insane. Particularly since it obviously burnt us last year too.

 

It was more about the tardiness and penalties than his play on the field, I keep repeating this but the local media said the organization and his teammates were tired of him and wanted him gone.

 

The only reason for trading Pickens now is to get something for him. He's a FA this offseason. If we aren't extending him, trade him while he has return value.

 

So give up on 2025. Got it.

If you're going to give up on a guy just because he is gone after the season, what the hell was the point of signing Rodgers and Slay? Why give Heyward what he wants? Just take the losing season and rebuild or keep Pickens and try to win now.

To take it even further, once they got Metcalf, they could have gone hard after Darnold. Sell him on the stud receivers. Pay the guy. The Seahawks didn't give him anything that crazy. Embrace the modern offense instead of relying on three tight ends all the time and do some real damage.

Even just going with Rodgers with the two stud receivers had merit, but pick a damn direction. Don't sit there and say they are going to keep Heyward and sign old guys like Rodgers and Slay, but Pickens has to go because he's going to leave as a free agent. Remember, also, that he could have gotten them a third-round compensatory pick if he left as a free agent.

 

The organization and teammates were wrong. A strong coach wouldn't allow the inmates to run the asylum, but Tomlin has been allowing that for years. Instead of finding ways to deal with challenging players, Tomlin wants them gone, which creates a drain of talent. You can't keep giving up quality players without getting a proper return without getting burned, and the Pickens trade has definitely left them with scorch marks.

The behavioral issues weren't going to go away, but they could be mitigated. Be willing to discipline him if he goes too far, as the Cowboys did two weeks ago, but don't give away their best offensive talent. As I pointed out, great coaches have had tremendous success dealing with guys like Pickens. Tomlin used to do that. Now it seems like he doesn't want to bother and the team is suffering for it.

 

Who the heck are you to tell a team to keep a cancer on the team if they wanted him gone .

 

I actually said, "the only reason is to get something in return". I didn't say I agree or disagree with the decision. Calm down.

 

The idea was we were all in on this year. It certainly would have been worth seeing how it worked out at least until the trade deadline.

The defense was supposed to be historical and you signed an all time great at the end of his career at QB. Hard to argue that dealing him for a third round pick before the season was what was best for the 2025 Steelers.

 

This defense is quite historical, 28th in total defense (368.1 yards per game) and 32nd in passing yards (273.3 per game) and on pace to be one of the worst Steelers defenses in franchise history. Very Buttercream soft. They invested some cap and didn't go cheap on the sprinkles this season.




It is hard to judge if the Pickens trade was ultimately good, because the organization itself is bad right now, making moves for a Head Coach that has zero ability to plan for the next game, his offensive ideas are crap, and lives in his fears over the middle of the field.

Does keeping Pickens make this team a contender? No. Does that 3rd round pick help turn this team around? No.

I guess ultimately your argument is correct, you brought in Rodgers and paid these so-called stars on defense to 'win now', so why trade away talent?

The argument Pickens is dysfunctional and a cancer kind of falls apart when the worst dysfunction and cancer in the organization causing it to fail is the Head Coach.

 

I'm the guy who is right while they were wrong. You are the guy who got suckered by the leaks from the team designed to smear Pickens after the trade to try to make that awful mistake look better.

 

There is a very good argument to be made that the Steelers would be 7-3 right now with Pickens instead of 5-5. With an elite pair of receivers and a defense that has its moments despite the overall struggles, they would at least be a dangerous playoffs team. As it is, they won't be there.

 

I'm quite calm. I'm annoyed with the Steelers for screwing this up so badly, but I'm calm. It helps that I'm right. In this case, I wish it wasn't the case, but I know I'm right.