Playing Without Big Ben

Behind every elite wide receiver, you’ll find a great quarterback playing in a great offensive system, making life easier for their pass-catchers. In 2019, Juju Smith-Schuster had neither of those. Michael Thomas’ rise to an elite NFL player has been propelled by Drew Brees and Sean Payton’s brilliant offense. Same for Julio Jones with Matt Ryan and Dirk Koetter’s pass-happy offensive approach. In the year where Smith-Schuster was set to take a leap to join Thomas and Jones, he lost the support system he needed.

Ben Roethlisberger has never been an immaculate quarterback, and at 38 years old, any chance of Big Ben ever becoming that quarterback flew out the window years ago. But, in defiance of all logic and reason, Roethlisberger can still deliver in his old age. In his last full season of football– the Steelers stalwart was accurate with the football and prolific enough to rank top five in the league in yards and touchdowns. 

Having Roethlisberger commanding the Steelers offense is what helped run as smoothly as it did, leading to big seasons from Smith-Schuster and the Pittsburgh offense as a whole. When Roethlisberger went down in Week Two of 2019, it tanked the Steelers entire operation, taking Juju down with it.

Roethlisberger looks set to return to the field in 2020, but will the future Hall of Fame player taking snaps once again give Smith-Schuster the spark he needs to ascend to an elite level? Well, maybe. But don’t throw 2019 out the window just because Smith-Schuster was playing without his quarterback– the receiver has a lot to work on himself if he hopes to climb the receiving ranks.