When the Steelers played the Jacksonville Jaguars on Sunday, the Jaguars made it apparent early that WR George Pickens was not going to be the one to beat them.
It started with the back-and-forth leading up to the game as S Rayshawn Jenkins said Pittsburgh hadn’t seen Jacksonville’s defensive backs when it cames to slowing down Pickens. Pickens then threw back that the Jaguars relied on “hope defense,” a line that the Jaguars ran with all week leading up to the game and threw back in Pickens’ face after beating Pittsburgh in Acrisure Stadium.
QB Mitch Trubisky mentioned after the game that Jacksonville was playing Cover 2 to his side and clouded him for most of the contest, taking away the opportunity to go to him downfield. Speaking to the media on Tuesday, OC Matt Canada mentioned the same thing, but stated that the offense needs to continue to find ways to give their big-play threat the ball even when coverage is focusing on him.
“Everybody wants George to get the ball,” Canada said Tuesday via video 93.7 The Fan’s Twitter page . “We saw what happened when he got it. But we got to be smart. We got to continue to work and find schematics to help him, and we’ll always try to do that. The defense can dictate that a little bit with any great wideout, which you guys study other people. you know that’s the case, right? A lot of big-time wideouts fight to get the ball and their targets are what they are. We feel good about the guys out there not allowing that to happen all the time because of Diontae [Johnson] and those things. We got some other weapons that they got to cover.”
Pickens was limited to just one catch on five targets for 22 yards, but that catch did go for a score where he hurdled a defender into the end zone to give Pittsburgh its only touchdown on the day. Canada mentioned that the team as well as the fan base wants to see Pickens heavily targeted because we have seen what he can do when he gets the ball thrown his way, being a human highlight reel for big splash plays that spark the offense. Even when he’s covered, he still has proven time and again that he can make catches in traffic, using his body control and strong hands to beat defensive backs at the catch point.
Pittsburgh must do a better job of scheming Pickens opportunities to keep him a regular factor that opposing defenses can’t take out of the game entirely. We have seen his route tree grow this season as Pickens has been working more in the middle of the field, creating more plays after the catch. He also does have the benefit of playing opposite Johnson, who is a quality receiver himself, helping take pressure off Pickens. In Johnson’s first game back from a hamstring injury against the Rams, Pickens went over 100 yards while Johnson had a strong performance himself with six catches for 79 yards.
When defenses attempts to take Pickens out of the game, that is only going to open up more one-on-one opportunities for Johnson to succeed, like he did against Jacksonville. Still, defenses would prefer to have Johnson beat them rather than Pickens, making it important to keep the latter involved in the offense, even when the opposition is trying to take him away. Pittsburgh will have a chance to accomplish that against the Titans Thursday night, looking for a game script like the one they authored in Los Angeles as Pickens and Johnson were both heavily involved.
