In one of the first major moves after the 2025 NFL Draft, the Pittsburgh Steelers agreed to send wide receiver George Pickens and a 2027 sixth-round pick to the Dallas Cowboys for a 2026 third-round pick and a 2027 fifth-round pick.
There has certainly been no shortage of negative narratives surrounding Pickens’ time in Pittsburgh, to the point where some have labeled him a distraction and pushed back against the idea that he could be the missing piece to the Cowboys’ offense. His evident frustration down the stretch only added fuel to those narratives.
CeeDee Lamb is still sure to get plenty of targets, and that has led to the suggestion that Pickens could quickly become frustrated again as the de facto WR2.
But another narrative that has been brought up is Pittsburgh’s history when it comes to losing star receivers and the fact that they have failed to produce elsewhere.
Over the last 20 seasons, the top seven wide receivers (excluding Pickens) they’ve drafted, from a yards per game standpoint, have gone on to play for other teams, and each one of them saw a significant decrease in production after leaving the Steel City.
It’s an alarming trend, for sure. But there are a few reasons, two in particular, why Cowboys fans should laugh off this narrative.
Two reasons Cowboys fans shouldn't overreact
First and foremost, every one of those other seven wideouts had Ben Roethlisberger throwing them the ball. Pickens had nothing close to that. He had Kenny Pickett, Mason Rudolph, Mitchell Trubisky, an aging Russell Wilson, and another quarterback in Justin Fields whom the Steelers clearly never trusted.
Now he has Dak Prescott, and say what you want about Prescott’s suspect track record in the playoffs, but the fact is that he knows what it takes to have regular season success and get the ball to his star receivers in doing so. Let’s not forget that he was the runner-up in MVP voting two years ago.
Quite frankly, the suggestion that Pickens will also see a dropoff of 20+ yards per game with clearly superior QB play is probably bolder than any suggestion of him being the Cowboys’ missing piece. He averaged 64.3 yards over 14 games in 2024, so a 20-yard dropoff over a 17-game season would only put him at slightly over 750 yards.
It would be a new career-low.
And then there is the fact that this list notably excludes one name, a former Pro Bowler who actually went on to have far more success after spending his first four seasons in Pittsburgh: Emmanuel Sanders.
Sanders was drafted by the Steelers in the third round of the 2010 NFL Draft and only averaged 36.3 yards per game from 2010 to 2013. He then signed with the Denver Broncos, and the Steelers found out exactly what they were missing out on right from the get-go.
Sanders’ first season in Denver saw him catch 101 passes for 1,404 yards and nine touchdowns, and it was the first of three 1,000-yard seasons for him, a three-year stretch which also saw him win Super Bowl L.
During that Super Bowl run, the Broncos beat the Steelers in the playoffs, and lo and behold, Sanders was their leading receiver in that Divisional Round game. Granted, he did have Peyton Manning throwing him the ball during two of those three seasons with the Broncos, but that version of Peyton Manning was a shell of himself from his first two years in Denver.
So you can’t really make the case that Sanders had a massive upgrade at QB. For Pickens, you can make that case.
Though Sanders did not notch another 1,000-yard season before his career ended in 2021, he still averaged 52.8 yards per game from 2017 to 2021. In total, he averaged 62.2 yards per game after leaving Pittsburgh, far higher than anybody else on this list except for Antonio Brown.
Pickens certainly has his work cut out for him, but Cowboys fans should not be taking this whole Pittsburgh wide receiver trend with more than a grain of salt.