If the opening offensive drive of the Pittsburgh Steelers’ ultimate preseason recreation is any indication, then second-year vast receiver George Pickens is in midseason kind.
Pickens, who wowed Steelers followers — and NFL followers alike — along with his catch radius as a rookie, turned in one of many extra spectacular performs of the preseason in Thursday night time’s preseason recreation towards the Atlanta Falcons. On the primary drive of the sport the Steelers confronted a 2nd-and-10 scenario on the Atlanta 36-yard line. Fellow second-year quarterback Kenny Pickett dropped into the pocket and regarded in Pickens’ course, because the receiver ran a go route.
They made the connection, due to an unimaginable effort from the receiver:
On this remoted digital camera angle, you may see the receiver not solely pull within the acrobatic reception, but additionally pull his left hand off the soccer and attain for the pylon along with his proper hand. One way or the other he has the energy to tug off this transfer:
Pittsburgh scored on the very subsequent play on a one-yard landing run from Najee Harris.
For his half, Pickett was 4-for-4 for 86 yards in only one drive of labor. That delivered to an in depth his preseason work, throughout which the second-year quarterback put up some spectacular statistics:
Kenny Pickett’s 2023 Preseason Stats:
5 Drives (All TDs)
13 of 15 passing
199 Yards
2 TDs
Good Passer Ranking (158.3)#Steelers #NFL
— Steelers Depot 7⃣ (@Steelersdepot) August 25, 2023
There’s some rising buzz concerning the Steelers this season. Kyle Brandt of the NFL Community labeled the Steelers a playoff crew, ESPN’s Ryan Clark in contrast Pickett to Ben Roethlisberger not too long ago, and Adam Schein of CBS Sports activities cautioned NFL followers to not sleep on Pittsburgh.
With numbers like this from Pickett — and performs like this from his favourite goal — these daring predictions might very properly come true.
