The Pittsburgh Steelers stunned the NFL world just a bit on Wednesday morning when news broke that they'd be trading star wide receiver George Pickens to the Dallas Cowboys.
As the day went on, plenty of thinking about the trade emerged, trying to justify Pittsburgh's move.
One of the team's beat reporters, Alan Saunders, pushed back against the varied logic. He wrote that there's only one way this move makes sense.
Saunders starts by saying this: "From a football perspective, this is a bad trade (for the Steelers). There’s no way around that."
So why did the Steelers do it?
"The Steelers were sick and tired of dealing with George Pickens," Saunders writes. "This was all about just being fed up with the player they were shipping out, and deciding that the whatever juice Pickens brought to the Steelers lineup was not worth the squeeze of his other antics."
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Pittsburgh has now sent the antics to the Cowboys, but it might come at a cost.
The Steelers are now relying on some combination of Roman Wilson and Calvin Austin to be a reliable WR2 alongside DK Metcalf.
Otherwise, the Steelers are basically right back where they started.
Pittsburgh got a third-round pick in return, but lost an established WR in the process.
"What they’re able to do with the draft pick, and whether Pickens is ever able to get his act together elsewhere, will go a long way toward evaluating whether this was the right trade down the road," writes Saunders.
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