{"id":73145,"date":"2023-12-20T01:08:49","date_gmt":"2023-12-20T01:08:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/nflnhungn.aweu.info\/?p=73145"},"modified":"2023-12-20T01:11:34","modified_gmt":"2023-12-20T01:11:34","slug":"steelers-urged-to-make-major-move-with-wr-george-pickens-nhungn","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nflnhungn.aweu.info\/steelers-urged-to-make-major-move-with-wr-george-pickens-nhungn\/","title":{"rendered":"Steelers Urged to Make Major Move With WR George Pickens"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Head coach Mike Tomlin of the Pittsburgh Steelers benched quarterback Mitch Trubisky for Week 16. NFL insider Peter King argued the Steelers should do the same with wide receiver George Pickens.<\/p>\n<p>During a guest appearance on 93.7 The Fan on December 19, King ripped into the 22-year-old receiver for his effort.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter\" src=\"https:\/\/heavy.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/12\/GettyImages-1699417408.jpg?quality=65&amp;strip=all&amp;w=780\" alt=\"George Pickens\" \/><\/p>\n<p>\u201cWhat George Pickens is doing right now is absolutely, totally, unacceptable,\u201d King said on The Cook &amp; Joe Show. \u201cI don\u2019t really care how great he could be or should be, I care about how great he is, and he\u2019s not great right now. Because there are plays where he absolutely dogs it.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cHis career\u2019s not over. It can be salvaged, it can be fixed. But if I were the Steelers right now \u2026 I know how important this game is \u2026 he\u2019d be deactivated Sunday against Cincinnati.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>That would be a drastic measure with the Cincinnati Bengals matchup in Week 16 being a must-win game for the Steelers. Pickens leads Pittsburgh with 52 receptions and 814 receiving yards this season.<\/p>\n<p>But the Steelers need a more consistent effort from their play-making wide receiver.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Steelers\u2019 George Pickens Receives Criticism for Blocking Effort in Second Straight Game<\/strong><br \/>\nThe most obvious play where Pickens displayed questionable effort in Week 15 against the Indianapolis Colts was on a running play.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">George Pickens standing still like it&#39;s draft night \ud83d\ude2d<\/p>\n<p> <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/nCfzxH5OBm\" target=\"_blank\">pic.twitter.com\/nCfzxH5OBm<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&mdash; NFL Notifications (@NFLNotify) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/NFLNotify\/status\/1736153569060171800?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">December 16, 2023<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>Running back Jaylen Warren broke outside and was approaching the goal line when Pickens appeared to be standing still. Then, he jumped out of the way instead of blocking a Colts defender.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cGeorge Pickens standing still like it\u2019s draft night,\u201d NFL Notifications X (formerly Twitter) account wrote.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Chuck Noll would&#39;ve had George Pickens running laps at halftime with an effort like this while the Steelers were losing 21-3 in the 2nd QTR. <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/UtWDxqAvug\" target=\"_blank\">pic.twitter.com\/UtWDxqAvug<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&mdash; Billy Hartford (@BudDupreeFan) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/BudDupreeFan\/status\/1732957879747973619?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">December 8, 2023<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>In Week 14, Pickens received criticism for his blocking effort against the New England Patriots from Amazon Prime\u2019s Kirk Herbstreit.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cHe\u2019s kind of taking the play off,\u201d Herbstreit said. \u201cI think it sends a message to me, to your team. I look at receivers when it comes to their willingness to block and the effort that they\u2019re willing to put forth.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt kind of represents the pulse of the team. Bad look.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Pickens received criticism on social media from Steelers and NFL fans for both plays.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cChuck Noll would\u2019ve had George Pickens running laps at halftime with an effort like this while the Steelers were losing 21-3 in the second quarter,\u201d wrote Billy Hartford on X.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Pickens Rips Media for Blocking Criticism<\/strong><br \/>\nSimilar to his play, Pickens has been stirring the pot with recent comments to the media. On December 14, Pickens blasted Pittsburgh\u2019s play calling, saying that he \u201ccan\u2019t really produce\u201d by running the very short routes the Steelers are asking him to.<\/p>\n<p>On December 19, he responded the criticism about his blocking.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cAll the people that\u2019s questioning my effort, they don\u2019t play football, they do what y\u2019all [in the media] do,\u201d Pickens told reporters, via Steelers Now\u2019s Nick Farabaugh. \u201cAll that people that got opinions, they\u2019re media, surface guys. None of them play football.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>There\u2019s an obvious flaw in that argument. Some of his critics, at least at one point, did play football.<\/p>\n<p>Although he didn\u2019t play in the NFL, Herbstreit played quarterback at Ohio State. Shannon Sharpe and Chad \u201cOchocinco\u201d Johnson played in the NFL. Sharpe is in the Pro Football Hall of Fame.<\/p>\n<p>Both Sharpe and Johnson criticized Pickens on their podcast, Nightcap, for having \u201clazy\u201d feet on a potential touchdown in Week 9 against the Tennessee Titans.<\/p>\n<p>After Week 7, Ben Roethlisberger was critical of Pickens on his podcast after the receiver earned two 15-yard penalties versus the Los Angeles Rams. Obviously, Roethlisberger played football too.<\/p>\n<p>Pickens, though, didn\u2019t just take issue with his apparent non-football playing critics. He added during his rant that he didn\u2019t block for Warren because he didn\u2019t want to get hurt.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI was just trying to prevent the Tank Dell situation, the same thing that happened to (him),\u201d Pickens said. \u201cI ain\u2019t want to get an injury. When you stay on the block too low, you can get ran up on very easily.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Houston Texans wide receiver Tank Dell suffered a season-ending injury on December 3 while blocking on a running play.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Head coach Mike Tomlin of the Pittsburgh Steelers benched quarterback Mitch Trubisky for Week 16. NFL insider Peter King argued the Steelers should do the same with&#8230; <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":73149,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-73145","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-nfl"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nflnhungn.aweu.info\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73145","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nflnhungn.aweu.info\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nflnhungn.aweu.info\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nflnhungn.aweu.info\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nflnhungn.aweu.info\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=73145"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nflnhungn.aweu.info\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73145\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nflnhungn.aweu.info\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/73149"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nflnhungn.aweu.info\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=73145"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nflnhungn.aweu.info\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=73145"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nflnhungn.aweu.info\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=73145"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}