3 reasons why Russell Wilson is doomed to fail with the Pittsburgh Steelers

2. Huge downgrade from Sean Payton to Arthur Smith

Does this need to be elaborated on at all? Arthur Smith is the new offensive coordinator for the Pittsburgh Steelers, and he is coming off of a 21-30 tenure with the Atlanta Falcons, a tenure in which his Falcons teams went 7-10 each year. Furthermore, his offenses in Atlanta never ranked higher than 15th in points scored.

The Falcons never ranked higher than 16th in passing yards per game and never ranked higher than 24th in passing touchdowns. The only redeeming quality of Smith's tenure in Atlanta was the rushing offenses in 2022 and 2023, ranking 3rd and 9th in yards per game. You can figure that the Pittsburgh Steelers will look a lot like the Falcons' offenses, so perhaps they will run the snot out of the ball.

But do they have the personnel along the offensive line to do that? Probably not. Arthur Smith has a huge challenge in Pittsburgh, and he's simply not in the same tier as Sean Payton. Heck, Smith might be among the worst offensive play-callers in the entire NFL. Sure, in some instances, talent can overcome coaching a bit, but the thing is, the Steelers don't have a ton of talent on offense.

This could shape up to be a brutal year for the Pittsburgh Steelers and Russell Wilson.