Pittsburgh Steelers head coach Mike Tomlin referred to last week’s social media distraction involving George Pickens as “a pebble in my shoe.”
Apparently, some of his other players saw it as potentially a large thorn in the side of the team because they felt the need to address it.
On Wednesday, both wide receiver Diontae Johnson and running back Najee Harris mentioned to the media that they spoke with Pickens at various points about the obvious frustration he was exuding as a result of getting just two catches for minus-1 yard last week against the Tennessee Titans.
“I was telling G.P. there is nothing wrong with being frustrated. It’s just how you handle things when you are frustrated,” Harris said Wednesday after practice.
In fact, Harris claims he didn’t even wait until the second half of the game began to address Pickens.
“I talked to him at halftime. Whenever you are a key player on offense, they aren’t just going to let you blow up the stat sheet,” Harris said. “They aren’t going let you be a game-wrecker. They are going to find ways to minimize that player. And once they find ways to minimize that player, it creates an opportunity to eat for somebody else. That’s part of the team.”
So, obviously, that means Pickens was at least starting to bubble up about not getting the ball enough, even with 30 minutes remaining in a close game. That’s to say nothing of Pickens failing to join the
“I don’t really mix social media and football together,” Pickens insisted. “Just clearing out my page. Nothing too crazy. It’s got nothing to do with the Steelers at all.”
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Maybe. Although,
“He felt like he had to handle it his way. But at the same time, it wasn’t the right time to do all that. I had a good talk with him. So he understands. He is going to be moving forward from it,” Johnson said. “You don’t want people creating a narrative of you. He understands.”
Pickens attempted to give off the vibe that he wasn’t frustrated by his meager three catches for 21 yards over the last two games.
“We got the victory. (Johnson) got a touchdown. We just engineered the victory. That’s all. I was happy, if anything,” Pickens said.
Predictably, Tomlin deflected the entire conversation the previous day during his weekly press conference.
“He expresses his frustration all the time. He wants to be significant. He wants to be a reason why we’re successful,” Tomlin said. “I want guys who want the football. I want guys who want to be central reasons why we’re successful. And so, that’s a non-issue, to be quite honest with you.”
That speech sounded very similar to ones we heard throughout Antonio Brown’s tenure here, in the aftermath of JuJu Smith-Schuster’s Tik-Tok logo dances and throughout Chase Claypool’s occasional bluster during his brief time in Pittsburgh.
With Tomlin, it was always, “There’s nothing to see here.” Yet there has been a long line of Steelers wide receivers who constantly give us something to watch. Now, Pickens appears to be the latest.
“It’s like reality television, the way you guys follow social media and write stories about it,” Tomlin added.
Well, I can’t entirely disagree with the head coach on that one. He’s kinda got us there.
Unfortunately, though, much like reality television, when it comes to his wide receivers, their social media activity is awfully tough to avoid.
As much as we all wish we could.
