The Pittsburgh Steelers were in a period of transition in 2022. Ben Roethlisberger retired at the end of the 2021 season and the Steelers did not seem to have a quarterback succession plan in place. When teams lose a Hall of Fame quarterback, they often wander in the wilderness of the NFL for a few seasons until they find a qualified successor. Steelers fans endured a 25-year journey after the last Steelers Hall of Fame quarterback Terry Bradshaw retired.
The search for the next franchise quarterback after Roethlisberger lasted for months until Franco Harris announced Kenny Pickett as the 20th pick in the 2022 NFL Draft. Pickett was the first quarterback chosen, but unlike so many other rookies in the last few seasons, he was not handed the job. Mitch Trubisky was the first-string quarterback for the preseason and the first four weeks of the regular season before Mike Tomlin tapped Pickett at halftime of the New York Jets game.
The 20th episode of Footbahlin With Ben Roethlisberger was released on Monday night. Spencer T’eo and the future Hall of Famer did their first live broadcast from Cinderlinds restaurant in Pittsburgh. The podcast duo welcomed Bob Pompeani, Andrew McCutchen, and Pat Freiermuth to a panel-style discussion in a relaxed atmosphere.
“How much different was it playing with Kenny than me,” Roethlisberger asked his former tight end.
Freiermuth, despite being one of the stars of the quirky Grillin' N' Chillin' show, is a man of few words. He seems ill at ease in the spotlight which is a trait he shares with former Steeler great, Heath Miller. Freiermuth took his turn on the hot seat and provided meaningful insight about the two signal-callers.
“I tell Kenny this all the time,” Freiermuth began. “It’s so different because we didn’t have hots. With you, we’d have a concept, how many times would you look at Tae [Diontae Johnson] and just give him one of these (points at head) and we would get a 12-yard completion? We didn’t have that this year.”
Roethlisberger forged a Hall of Fame career by improvisation and feel. He did not ignore coaching, but his greatest team success was found with Bruce Arians, who was more of a collaborator with him than a coach. His statistics were better with Todd Haley, but the two chafed against each other with very different ideas of how an offense should run. Last season under Matt Canada, Roethlisberger seemed to throw away play calls at the line of scrimmage casually:
“Instead of looking at you the whole time,” Freiermuth continued, “We were looking at the coverage and saying, 'Ok, I know what I’m supposed to do.' It was almost too slow at first, with you we could see cover 0 and you were giving us a ram. So that was the most different.”
Pickett had a significant presence as a rookie and unlike Trubisky, seemed to be more animated at the line of scrimmage. During the season, there was some controversy about Pickett not being allowed to audible in Matt Canada’s offense, which the offensive coordinator adamantly previously denied. Canada calls them 'checks' and stated earlier in this season after Trubisky allegedly said he couldn't audible; that the Steelers had checks (also commonly known as 'hots').
"I think that question has come up," Matt Canada previously stated. "Audibles and checks, we have obviously had checks in our offense forever. There's times he goes up there and has to check, run-to-run, pass-to-pass, based on look, based on technique."
The Steelers' decision to retain Canada has been heavily criticized and if this was initially true, did the organization do damage control by denying it? Why would Freiermuth be under that impression, and did the youth and inexperience of the offense significantly hamper the offense during the rookie's first few starts? If there was truth to this rumor and it wasn't short-lived, the premise that changing offensive coordinators advanced by Art Rooney II could hamper Pickett at the obvious behest of the coaching staff could have been under a false premise.
If Canada doesn't trust Pickett, why bring him back? If he gained trust in the rookie later in the season, it is still coaching malpractice to put your rookie in that position. Roethlisberger and Freiermuth agreed that the young signal-caller got better at that part of the game during the season and they both saw significant improvement in that area:
“When we had Ben and stuff wasn’t going well, like in the two-minute drive, we knew who to look to,” Freirmuth responded. “The two-minute drive from Miami to then the Raiders, to the Ravens, in the huddle, it was two completely different people. In the huddle, he was waiting to kind of feel things out and see what they were in, but then like, he was so much more confident and urgent and knew what he was going to do.”
Pickett’s late-season heroics kept the Steelers slim playoff hopes alive during successive weeks and he demonstrated the ability to win close games late. Roethlisberger may be the best quarterback in NFL history in one-score games and Pickett’s acumen for the situation will be severely tested in a highly competitive AFC North over his career.
The rookie’s growth in the two-minute offense over a matter of weeks does lead to the question of why Tomlin and Canada would have inserted him into the lineup early in the season and not installed hot packages at the line as Freiermuth alleges during his remarks. It also leads to the more serious question of if Kenny Pickett started to feel more comfortable calling his plays in the two-minute drill than what was being relayed by Canada.
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