Nov. 21, 2023, may not quite be a day that will live in infamy, but it may be a day that Pittsburgh Steelers fans celebrate as the day that the team fired offensive coordinator Matt Canada. He is out of the job after two-and-a-half seasons running the ship. But it’s fair to question if anybody can steer it back on the right path.
Come up with your own analogy of what the nautical equivalent of the quarterback would be, but do the Steelers have the answer at that position? That’s the most important question in the post-Canada offense. Fox Sports analyst and former NFL WR James Jones is not confident that Kenny Pickett is the answer.
“I wouldn’t put all the blame on Kenny Pickett. But I’m putting most of it on him”, he said during a SPEAK segment also featuring LeSean McCoy, Emmanuel Acho, and Joy Taylor as the panel debated whether the quarterback was getting a pass for his own culpability in the offense’s struggles.
“You can’t blame all this on the offensive coordinator”, he said, proceeding to rattle off the talent that the Steelers have at the skill positions. “This young kid’s got help and he’s not making these dudes around him better. He’s making these dudes around him worse. You can say play calling all you want. He misses a lot of throws, and not a lot of tight-window throws. A lot of wide-open throws”.
While Pickett can’t do too much to the detriment of the running backs, one can certainly make the case that his rapport with his top wide receivers has been lacking. Most egregious was his several misses in the direction of Diontae Johnson this past Sunday against the Cleveland Browns, but his chemistry with George Pickens has often been little better.
Some of that is just not being on the same page, Pickett expecting his receiver to do one thing while he actually does another. But there is also no denying that he deserves some of the blame for missed reads and missed throws. Any quarterback would but not with the frequency we have seen in Pittsburgh.
“I don’t care about the wins. I don’t care about the losses. I care about you looking the right way”, Jones argued. “Kenny Pickett is not seeing the football field the right way. He’s throwing back-shoulders and his receiver’s on top of the defender. There ain’t nowhere to throw back shoulders on that. He has guys wide open in the football field and he’s missing these throws”.
A 2022 first-round draft pick, Pickett is now 22 starts into his career. He is the only player in NFL history to have a touchdown rate below two percent on 500 or more pass attempts, which is certainly not the company you want to keep—just yourself, all alone on a very undesirable stat.
