Flavell's Five Thoughts: Steelers Have Stars, And a Possible Bust

The vibe of the Pittsburgh Steelers right now is a question.

Author:
Cody Flavell
Publish date:
Oct 3, 2022 9:00 AM EDT

In this story:

With about seven minutes left in the halftime ceremony, Kenny Pickett emerged from the Pittsburgh Steelers’ locker room, grabbed a helmet, a football and started throwing warm-up tosses. As teammates came over and greeted him, it became increasingly clear that he would lead the team onto the field when the Steelers' offense took the field in the second half.

Take a look for yourself.

The Steelers offense needed a shot in the arm and Kenny Pickett provided that on Sunday.

The energy inside of Acrisure Stadium would’ve had you believing that the Steelers won the game by 20+ points. Instead, Pittsburgh was on the losing end of the game to the New York Jets by a final score of 24-20.

Clearly, there’s nothing of intrigue to talk about so this Flavell’s Five will be as boring as they come, right? Oh, quite the contrary, you silly yinzer. Let’s do some unpacking.

It’s Kenny’s Team Now and You Can Not Look Back

Mike Tomlin made the decision to cut the cord with opening day starting quarterback Mitch Trubisky after three and a half underwhelming games. The inevitability of Pickett supplanting Trubisky certainly was an elephant in the room. The timing, however, wasn’t quite cut and dry.

Tomlin felt that six points against an inferior team was enough to throw the rookie in and see what he could do. It turned out to be a little bit of everything.

Pickett finished 10-of-13 for 120 yards with all three of his incompletions going for interceptions. The 14 second-half points were scored on the count of Pickett’s legs after two rushing scores of his own pushed the Steelers out to a 10-point lead.

You could argue none of Pickett’s interceptions were his fault. Both Chase Claypool and Pat Freiermuth had hands on the balls thrown their way but dropped them into Jets’ defender's hands. The third interception came on the final play of the game which ended up being a Hail Mary attempt.

Now that Pickett has stepped foot on an NFL field, there’s no way Tomlin can go back to Trubisky even for next weekend’s tilt against the offensive juggernaut Buffalo Bills. He has made the decision that Pickett serves this team its best chance to win and the team seemed to respond well to Pickett’s insertion into the game.

Pickett made the throws he had to make and didn’t look like the game was too big for him. Those are traits you like to see out of a first-round quarterback.

As a young gunslinger, turnovers are going to happen. Pickett will be more apt to take risks, something Trubisky refused to do, and, in turn, throw interceptions. Pickett will see Buffalo, Tampa Bay, Miami, and Philadelphia in the next month before the bye. Those won’t be easy games and we’ll find out a lot about Pickett in the next month through this gauntlet part of the schedule.

Every time I think of Chase Claypool, I can’t shake the image of him selfishly pointing following his inconsequential first down with less than a minute left against the Vikings last season and then getting mad when teammates were yelling at him to line up for a play in which they had to spike the ball.

His offseason quotes and attitude suggested that he’d grown up and was ready to show that he is a legitimate NFL receiver. In the words of Judge Smails in Caddyshack… ”well…we’re waiting!”

Through four games, Claypool has 11 receptions for 79 yards. He’s got 47 yards on seven rushes. All in all, Claypool has 18 touches for 126 all-purpose yards. Abysmal.

Claypool often drew the ire of Ben Roethlisberger in his rookie season before showing a little growth despite scaled-back numbers last year and then hitting a wall so far through four games. To be fair, Trubisky has been the quarterback and Claypool isn’t viewed as a guy that gets open near the line of scrimmage.

Being a vertical threat in an offense that throws short to the perimeter isn’t going to get Claypool the numbers he desires. At 6’4”, Claypool is best used downfield. Maybe with Pickett at quarterback, his chances to put his talent to use will rise as the Steelers likely will throw downfield more. Otherwise, Claypool doesn’t provide much to the Steelers’ offense going forward.

Adversely, Pickens and Freiermuth Shine

If George Pickens hadn’t gotten hurt at Georgia, it is likely he would’ve been the first receiver off the board in the NFL Draft this past spring. Much to the Steelers’ fortune, Pickens’ stock fell and the Steelers were the beneficiary.

Pickens spent the first three games getting open downfield for Trubisky not to even see him. Sunday, that changed and Pickens had his coming out game.

On six receptions, Pickens racked up 102 yards receiving in what could be the first of many such occasions. He didn’t have a touchdown but he showed a solid rapport with Pickett and they look like a tandem that can be lethal for the Steelers. He made another acrobatic highlight-reel catch that set the Steelers up for one of Pickett’s two rushing touchdowns.

Freiermuth, last season’s second-round choice, is quickly becoming one of the more reliable tight ends across the NFL. The soon-to-be 24-year-old hauled in seven catches and had 85 yards receiving. Oftentimes, a tight end is a rookie quarterback’s best friend. It is easy to see a path to sustained success for Freiermuth going forward.

Steelers Were Better at Getting After Zach Wilson

Since T.J. Watt’s injury, quarterback pressure has been hard to come by for the Steelers’ front seven. Sunday represented their best game in that regard since their seven-sack effort against the Bengals in week one.

While they only had one sack this week, they were able to record six quarterback hits and multiple other occasions where they had Zach Wilson running around in the backfield. Wilson stood tall in the face of pressure and adversity and tossed for a cool 252 yards and caught a receiving touchdown.

Wilson did throw two interceptions and the Steelers’ pressure sure helped that. Alex Highsmith, the NFL’s sack leader entering the week added another one for 5.5 now on the year. Highsmith was very close to another one or two as well had he been able to prevent Wilson from slipping away as he did much of the afternoon.

With a few high-tempo offenses in the docket, the Steelers have no choice but to continue to get after the quarterback and force rash decisions or else they could be staring the bottom of the AFC clear in the face.

What Exactly is the Vibe Right Now?

Finally, everyone was treated to Kenny Pickett. There was a lot of good and some bad but that’s life with a rookie quarterback in the NFL. The offense seemed to respond well to Pickett. Yet, here we are after week four and the Pittsburgh Steelers sit at 1-3 with four very hard games on the schedule.

Because the AFC North has seen nobody take a clear hold of the division, the Steelers are only a game out of first place in their division. That doesn’t mean much if the Steelers continue to lose but their season is far from over.

The rookie is in now and it is the excitement everyone had been waiting for. And, yet, the Pittsburgh Steelers lost a home game to the New York Jets.

To me, the vibe is cautious optimism.

As of this writing, the Pittsburgh Steelers opened as 13.5-point underdogs to the Buffalo Bills. That feels absurd for an NFL game but are we really questioning it?

If Trubisky starts, there is every reason to believe it’ll be more of the same and Buffalo could run away with the game. If Pickett starts, the chance to make more downfield plays arises but so does the potential for turnovers as we saw Sunday.

Who is to say how this next month goes? Maybe Pickett is the can of Red Bull this team needed. They rattle off two or three surprising wins and might just be sitting atop their division heading into the bye week. Or, maybe, the Steelers find out Pickett isn’t going to cut it either and now they’re staring a top-10 pick right in the mouth next season.

At this point, the Steelers are playing on house money. There isn’t much of an outside expectation for this team to do anything more than sit in the middle of the NFL’s standings. One way or another, we’re going to find out a lot about Kenny Pickett and this Pittsburgh Steelers on-field product over the course of the rest of the season.

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