Why George Pickens may be worth benching in Week 1 against the Falcons despite hopes of a 2024 breakout

Pickens may disappoint Fantasy managers in Week 1

By Dave Richard

Sep 5, 2024 at 8:14 am ET • 2 min read

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George Pickens' debut as the Steelers' go-to receiver on Sunday at Atlanta has potential to be a dud.

It's exactly the opposite of how things were supposed to go for Pickens. After the Steelers dealt Diontae Johnson, it was crystal clear that Pickens would become the team's top wideout.

That part hasn't changed. Other factors in the Steelers offense have -- and the road matchup against the Falcons got a lot tougher over the last month, too.

Pickens is squarely a flex in my Week 1 rankings.

We know that Russell Wilson is the Steelers starting quarterback despite a handful of tepid preseason drives. He completed 68% of his throws for 6.1 yards per attempt with no touchdowns with Wilson's best completion a 32-yard corner route to Pickens where the since-released Lions cornerback in coverage slipped.

The hope is that Wilson rediscovers the efficient numbers he had last year in Sean Payton's offense, including an impressive 5.8% TD rate. But Sean Payton's offense isn't Arthur Smit's offense. Smith is known for being a maestro of the run game. With inferior quarterbacks for most of his time in Atlanta, he dialed up 31.2 pass attempts per game last year and even fewer the year before. Wilson himself averaged under 30 pass attempts per game in 2023, so chances of him throwing a ton of footballs from week to week feel slim.

Making things tougher are the Falcons themselves. Their improvements include hiring defensive guru Raheem Morris to coach the team and Jimmy Lake to coordinate the defense, signing safety Justin Simmons and acquiring pass rusher Matt Judon. The Falcons are already returning a stout defensive line, and the Steelers offensive line have already incurred multiple injuries. These things are all going to make things tougher on Wilson, which in turn hurts Pickens.

Pickens also figures to be covered a good amount of the time by cornerback A.J. Terrell. Last year Terrell allowed a catch rate under 58% with four scores on 76 targets. It's entirely possible Terrell shadows Pickens as long as he doesn't go into the slot, which Pickens did on just 17% of his snaps last year.

The last expectation might be the most impactful: Morris' defenses tend to have a zone-heavy lean to them. For example, in his three years as defensive coordinator with the Rams, Morris had one game where he played less than 70% of the snaps in zone coverage. Pickens played a ton against zone, but he was a man-coverage destroyer last season:

Split	Tar	Tar/Route	Rec	Rec%	Yds	RcTD	Yds/Rec	Yd/Rt	AY/Tar	YAC/Rec	ExplREC%
Man	27	27.3%	13	48.1%	340	3	26.2	3.43	14.41	10.5	33.3%
Zone	74	17.9%	47	63.5%	788	2	16.8	1.9	13.66	5.4	24.3%
Totals	106	19.8%	63	59.40%	1140	5	18.1	2.13	13.47	6.2	25.50%

Two of his three biggest plays -- touchdowns of 86 and 66 yards -- all came against man coverage. And you can see he got more targets and was more explosive when the Steelers saw man coverage last year. The thought is that those kinds of opportunities will be hard for him to come by against Morris' zone-heavy defense.

Pickens is much easier to start as a flex this week. Let's see how the Steelers offensive line handles an upstart Falcons pass rush, and how Wilson operates behind that line. And let's see how defenses cover Pickens when the rest of the Steelers offense is thin on alternate playmakers.

I'd rather start: Stefon Diggs, Chris Godwin, Terry McLaurin