Steelers who have offered almost nothing to the team in 2022
By Tommy Jaggi
The Pittsburgh Steelers have a few X-Factors on their team, but these players haven’t offered anything special during the 2022 season.
Becoming one of the best football teams in the world takes a collective effort. Like a well-oiled machine, players and positional groups must be firing on all cylinders in order to get hot enough to make a run at a Super Bowl. Unfortunately, this has been far from the case for the Pittsburgh Steelers in 2022.
While Pittsburgh does have star players (like T.J. Watt and Minkah Fitzpatrick) who can greatly impact the outcome of the game when playing healthy and at their best, they have other players this year who haven’t done much to separate themselves from other average players around the league.
This doesn’t mean that these players can’t turn it around to make an impact in 2022, but so far this year, they have offered almost nothing to the team.
Diontae Johnson has been a non-factor
I like Diontae Johnson, and I think he’s a good football player. However, it’s hard to argue that his presence has made a huge difference on the Pittsburgh Steelers in 2022. After being the clear go-to option for Ben Roethlisberger over the past few seasons, Johnson’s production and efficiency have taken a major hit this season.
After averaging nearly 11 yards per reception over his first three seasons, that number has fallen all the way to just above 9 yards per catch for Johnson this year, per ESPN stats. This is in addition to fewer yards per game in any season since his rookie year and the lowest catch percentage of his career.
Much of this can be attributed to playing with new quarterbacks in Mitch Trubisky and Kenny Pickett. However, great players need to be able to overcome adversity to play key roles. Sadly, Johnson has been just okay this year — which isn’t what you want from a receiver who is making over $18 million per season.