Steelers wide receiver George Pickens played a career-low 34 offensive snaps in last Sunday night’s loss to the Cowboys, but head coach Mike Tomlin said on Tuesday that it wasn’t due to any issues with the effort Pickens is displaying on the field.
Tomlin referenced managing Pickens’s workload after the game and did so again on Tuesday when asked about Pickens playing fewer snaps than wideouts Van Jefferson and Calvin Austin. Tomlin said he doesn’t have “any outlying issue with his effort” while saying that Pickens isn’t the only player whose snaps the team is monitoring.
“Just a snap management thing and an effort to be more productive in today’s game regarding analytics,” Tomlin said. “We do it across a lot of positions, particularly when you look at the totality of a 17-game schedule. I’d imagine Cam Heyward, for example, is playing less snaps than he has. Just trying to grow and trying to get optimum productivity among some individuals and going about the best means of doing so, and, so, that’s probably a reflection of the snap totality of last week.”
Tomlin said that he has become “more sensitive” to snap management and not playing players on every snap “because you need them in significant moments.”
Tomlin was also asked whether he spoke to Pickens about yanking Cowboys cornerback Jourdan Lewis down by his facemask at the end of the game. Tomlin said he doesn’t detail those conversations in press conferences, but said he believes Pickens has “certainly gotten better” about handling his emotions since arriving in Pittsburgh even if that moment or one where he slammed his helmet down fell short of that standard.