Welcome to DK Sports Radio and a new Daily Shot of Steelers, my every-weekday, half-hour program on the local football franchise. Today's episode: Pending free agent JuJu Smith-Schuster shouldn’t be seen by management as a priority. and that's got nothing to do with any of his much-discussed off-field activity.
Also, hey, just below, you'll find a full transcript of the opening segment:
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THE TRANSCRIPT
Everyone loves to talk about JuJu Smith-Schuster, right?
And increasingly of late, there's a lot of discussion and debate about whether or not the Steelers should keep JuJu from becoming a free agent.
I have a pretty strong viewpoint on this. But it won't be based on, oh, 99.999% of the criteria that everyone else seems to be using.
JuJu does his thing. He dances on logos, he builds his brand, he doesn't look like he's moved at all whenever the Steelers lose. And that's going to be the kind of thing that some people will have a really hard time with and others, more likely due to generational differences, won't. My own take on that stuff is, you know, whatever. It's just whatever. I'll have a fun conversation about it if anybody wants to, and I'll share my own viewpoints, whether those are viewpoints established in the past or viewpoints from listening to younger people today and trying to get their sense for why they think he's so awesome. And I'm open-minded on that front.
But I don't want the Steelers to resign him, and it's got nothing to do with any of that stuff. I'm sorry, it just doesn't.
Fact of the matter is, he just hasn't been a very good football player for the last couple of years.
No more than a few minutes had elapsed from when the Steelers were beaten by the Browns in the playoffs than did Ben Roethlisberger take to the Zoom room and find a way to let all of us on the call and in the stadium how it'd be really nice if the Steelers brought JuJu back. That was a pretty rough day for the organization, a pretty rough day for the quarterback and his center and a lot of other people. But Ben still found it important enough in that moment, in that setting to send a signal not to us, not to you, but directly to the people running the Steelers, that it would be awesome to have JuJu back.
I'm not sure I understand that. Because this quarterback didn't use JuJu to his capabilities, didn't hit him downfield so that he could stretch things out and, in reality, demonstrated a clear preference for Diontae Johnson whenever he needed to move the sticks, and Chase Claypool when he needed to put up points. JuJu couldn't have been a more distinct No. 3 wide receiver in this offense, not even if he'd been someone who took 82.2% of all of his snaps out of the slot. ... Oh wait, he did. ranking No. 1, actually, among all NFL wide receivers in that category.
He's a slot receiver. And he's become a slot receiver who's no longer the big-play rookie who had everyone all wound up a couple years ago, enough that he was part of that NFL Centennial commercial right out there with all these living legends. One problem has materialized since that year. He no longer makes big plays. He makes lots of small plays.
I'm going to read you some other numbers. His base stats were 97 catches, seventh in the NFL, and 831 receiving yards and nine touchdowns. His yards after the catch were 301, which as 75th in the league. Targeted air yards, meaning how far the ball travels to get to you from line of scrimmage, were 5.8 per pass attempt. That ranked 160th in the league. He was targeted for a deep ball six times the entire season, 94th in the league. I think you're getting the idea here.
The Steelers need to spread their offense out. The Steelers need to stretch things. The best way to do that is to take full advantage of Diontae as a true No. 1 wide receiver in the NFL, which I believe he is even after the episode with the drops ... and to make Claypool your clear No. 2. Chase can do it all. JuJu can't. And then you have James Washington who, for reasons I've not understood at all, has been grossly underutilized. Not just by the head coach, not just by the coordinator, but also by the quarterback, Ben's always talking about how he's lobbying to get James on the field, but James comes on the field and Ben doesn't do anything with him.
Now, yeah, somebody's going to get hurt. You're going to need more you're going to need depth. I get that part. But are you going to pay JuJu a free agent's wage to be depth? Because that's what he should be.
I feel like I need to reiterate the disclaimer here: I really don't care what he does off the field. I don't care how he is with reporters how he is with me, how he is with you, if he's giving out money left and right and doing all these good deeds and whatever. He's gonna do that wherever he is, and good for him. Wonderful. Not what we're talking about. Believe it or not, it's OK, Pittsburgh, to talk about actual football, which is almost always my intent here.
I wouldn't be paying JuJu as a free agent because that money can be far better allocated by this football team. Never mind who you could keep on defense who's a better football player who has a bigger impact, like, for example, by Bud Dupree, Mike Hilton, and I could even make an argument for Cam Sutton in that context as well, because Joe Haden's not going to be around forever. There's three guys on defense right there alone that I'd rather see JuJu's money go to. But even on offense, if you're looking to spend money. presuming they don't get some big-time running back in the draft, they could sure use one out of free agency. Or presuming Maurkice Pouncey retires -- and my feeling is that's a pretty safe presumption -- you're going to need a center through trade or free agency. You're not going to be able to get one out of the draft and have that kid show up in Latrobe and do what Maurkice did and just knock everybody over on their rear ends the day he shows up. Maurkice was special. This center class for the draft is not seen as anything great. You want to spend money, go get a center. Go pay up for a big time center to help anchor an offensive line that's otherwise going to be frighteningly young.
That matters. That's where you put your cash. You don't put it into your fourth-best wide receiver.
