I’ve already written the Pittsburgh Steelers’ 2023 season will largely be determined by the jump Kenny Pickett makes. The more of a leap he makes, the more the team will follow. But what does that leap look like? While it can be tough to quantify and stats only tell one part of the story, if there’s a blueprint for Pickett to follow, look no further than Jacksonville’s Trevor Lawrence.
While Lawrence was regarded as a far better prospect, they were both first round picks, both new faces of the franchise. Under the terrible coaching of Urban Meyer, Lawrence had a poor rookie year. Pickett didn’t deal with quite those circumstances but he was thrown into the fire in a bumpy 2022 for the Steelers’ offense. Stack their numbers side-by-side and they were pretty darn similar.
| Kenny Pickett (Year 1) | Trevor Lawrence (Year 1) | |
|---|---|---|
| Completion % | 63% | 59.6% |
| TDs-TD% | 7-1.8% | 12-2.0% |
| INT-INT% | 9-2.3% | 17-2.8% |
| Y/A | 6.2 | 6.0 |
| QB Rating | 76.7 | 71.9 |
Pickett’s completion percentage was slightly better but not a great figure. Both players threw more interceptions than touchdowns with near-identical Y/A, throwing short than long, with a very similar QB rating.
Last season was a big one for Lawrence. With a better coaching staff, supporting cast, and stability, he made the leap. Here’s how his Year One and Year Two numbers compare.
| Trevor Lawrence (Year 1) | Trevor Lawrence (Year 2) | |
|---|---|---|
| Completion % | 59.6% | 66.3% |
| TDs-TD% | 12-2.0% | 25-4.3% |
| INT-INT% | 17-2.8% | 8-1.4% |
| Y/A | 6.0 | 7.0 |
| QB Rating | 71.9 | 95.2 |
His completion percentage went up almost seven points. He more than doubled his touchdowns, cut his interception rate in half, his Y/A jumped by a yard, and his QB rating shot up nearly 25 points.
Let’s just map out what that’d look like for Kenny Pickett if he made the same jump as Lawrence. For the sake of argument, we’ll assume he throws the ball a little less this year and finishes the season with 510 passing attempts, 30 per game, compared to Lawrence’s 584 a year ago.
| Kenny Pickett (Year 1) | Kenny Pickett (Year 2) | |
|---|---|---|
| Completion % | 63% | 70.1% |
| TDs-TD% | 7-1.8% | 20-4.1% |
| INT-INT% | 9-2.3% | 6-1.2% |
| Y/A | 6.2 | 7.2 |
| QB Rating | 76.7 | 100.0 |
Of course, that stat line is unlikely to actually occur. A 70% completion rate is asking too much and ideally, he throws more than 20 touchdowns, which would be an average of just more than one per game. Matching Lawrence’s mark of 25 would be closer to ideal. Only throwing six picks is going to be tough, though Pickett took tremendous care of the ball after the bye last season.
Still, if we pretended those were his numbers and Pickett improved his sophomore season to a throwing for 3672 yards (the extrapolation of 510 attempts at a 7.2 Y/A) with a 70.1% completion rate, 20 touchdowns, six picks, and QB rating of 100 on the nose…you’d take that. In a heartbeat. And just hope the run game finished off a ton of those drives.
The exacts of the numbers don’t matter that much. All of this is to say is there’s a clear and very recent blueprint of how Pickett can make a jump from Year One to Year Two. And I’d like to see him get close to what Lawrence did his sophomore season. If he can do that coupled with passing the eye test, having good tape, it’ll be the leap that Pittsburgh needs.
