For NFL wide receivers, playing with Aaron Rodgers is a blessing and a curse. On one hand, he makes the team better and is one of the best quarterbacks of all time. On the other hand, he likes to spread the ball around and doesn’t feed targets to his top receivers the way other quarterbacks do.
Some players have trouble trading personal stats for team success, but fortunately for the Pittsburgh Steelers, DK Metcalf isn’t one of them. Based on his recent comments to the media, he and his teammates aren’t concerned about their individual production.
“Y’all might get frustrated with that. We don’t. We are just trying to win,” Metcalf told reporters this week. “I think every receiver room that I’ve been in, once you put in the work and the time…you gotta respect the guys who are getting targets. From the moment that I got here, everyone’s worked their butts off. Everybody rightfully deserves a shot at the ball.”
With the Steelers leading the AFC North at 5-3, they can’t complain.
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Metcalf leads Pittsburgh with 47 targets, averaging 5.9 targets per game and accounting for 20.2 percent of the team’s targets. By comparison, he averaged 7.5 career targets per game with the Seattle Seahawks before joining the Steelers.
Even so, Rodgers is still finding Metcalf where and when it matters. Metcalf has already matched his touchdown total from last year with five, and it’s only halfway through the season.
Rodgers will lead Pittsburgh’s passing attack on the road against the Los Angeles Chargers on Sunday Night Football this week, where the Steelers will face a pass defense that’s allowed the third-fewest passing yards per game and second-fewest passing touchdowns in the NFL this year.
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Featured image via Barry Reeger/Imagn Images