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Pittsburgh Steelers rookie wide receiver George Pickens seemingly made the impossible look easy on a weekly basis last season, routinely hauling in 50-50 balls like he was playing a routine game of catch with quarterback Kenny Pickett. If you thought Pickens caught more contested balls than the average receiver, you’d be right. Pickens ranked second in the NFL in Catch Rate Over Expected, or CROE, a stat that “measures the difficulty of completion using a number of factors, including separation from nearest defender, depth of target and speed,” per NFL.com and Next Gen Stats.
“Pickens caught 61.9 percent of his 84 targets in 2022, exceeding expectation at a rate of nearly 11 percent. That helped him lead all rookies in receiving yards gained over expected with +183; he ranked 10th in that metric among pass catchers of every experience level (excluding running backs). Pickens also caught passes with the least average separation of any player on this list at 2.4 yards per target, and he posted the best CROE on tight-window throws at +32.9%, more than double the mark of Mike Williams, the next-closest pass catcher, underscoring his ability to consistently make difficult plays,” Nick Shook wrote for NFL.com.
Pickens’ xCatch, or expected catch rate, was 51.4 percent, so his 61.9 percent catch rate is significantly above what was expected. Pickens did most of his damage on go routes, running 234 (the only receiver to run more than 200 in the NFL), catching 16 of the 28 balls thrown to him while running vertically. His CROE on go routes was +23.3%, and Shook notes the NFL average for CROE on go routes since 2018 is -0.1%.
Pickens has proven to be a contested catch artist, and his prolific ability to win 50-50 balls on go routes was a good bit of his receiving production in 2022. We know Pickens can make tough plays and throwing him 50-50 balls on go routes worked more often than not in 2022. But the totality of Pickens’ numbers — 52 receptions, 801 yards, four touchdowns — should improve. And to improve those numbers, Pickens’ route tree has to expand.
Sure, watching him make impressive catches down the sideline with a defender draped all over him is awesome. It’s fun to watch, but it’s not a sustainable offense. While Pickens can make those plays, it shouldn’t be relied upon for him to contort his body and make superhuman catches down the sideline.
Let him run some slants and some post routes and not just limit him to running straight and making a tough play on the ball. Obviously, don’t eliminate the go route, because he’s effective with it, but Pickens needs to be able to do more to be the true No. 2 receiver in the offense. If his route tree expands, he’s going to take that next step forward and be a potential 1,000-yard receiver.
Pickens is an athletic marvel, but his offensive output can’t be reliant on him making contested catches. It’s a good thing he was able to pull them in at a high rate and give the Steelers some explosive plays in 2022, but his game should be expanded next year. Let’s see if that happens, and if it does, Pickens could have a breakout in Year 2.
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