Steelers’ latest excuse for Roman Wilson’s lack of involvement on offense proves they have already moved on in Pittsburgh
Mike Tomlin’s latest reason for Roman Wilson’s lack of snaps suggests the Steelers are nearing the end of the Wilson experience.
One of Mike Tomlin’s most famous clichés is when he talks about players’ ability to get up to speed. Or as he puts it, “hop on a moving train.” Well, in the case of Roman Wilson, he’s now had nearly two full seasons with the Pittsburgh Steelers, and the only train he may be hopping on is the one headed out of town.
Last year, it was injuries and not being ready in his rookie season. This year, the Steelers said they wanted Wilson to trust himself more and that they were treating this as a rookie season. Then came last week’s game against the Browns. In a depleted WR room, Wilson logged just nine snaps and no targets. To make matters worse, however, when Tomlin was asked about Wilson’s lack of involvement after the fact, it was clear he was just making it up as he went.
Mike Tomlin blames third down for Roman Wilson’s lack of snaps against Cleveland
“You know, particularly when you’re not winning third downs, I don’t think anyone plays as much as they would like,” said Tomlin during his weekly presser via the Pittsburgh Steelers YouTube channel. “We’ve had this conversation many times about running the football. I felt really good about our run plan. I thought we had an opportunity to really control the game through those means, and we didn’t have a bad running day.
“But we certainly didn’t have as good a running day as we could have had had we converted more possession downs. And I think the same could be said about levels of participation for guys like Roman and thus their ability to impact the game, and in a positive way.”
I mean, Tomlin is not one to ever be short on words, but that was a word salad right there. Why in the world, on third down, would you not want more capable wide receivers on the field?
What Tomlin probably wanted to say was something along the lines of: “Look, I’ll be honest, this relationship just hasn’t worked out, and we don’t trust Wilson to go out there and execute, or at least not yet.”
Because at this point, everything else is just an excuse. An excuse that buys the Steelers time from admitting that they whiffed on a draft pick. Maybe that changes in the future, but right now, as it has been for the past two years, it’s clear the Steelers have no intention of using Wilson.
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