Report: Russell Wilson at odds with Arthur Smith, unlikely to return to Steelers

Maybe scratch out what I said a month ago about the Seattle Seahawks playing Russell Wilson’s Pittsburgh Steelers next season. They’ll definitely be playing the Steelers, but Russ at quarterback is a different story.

A pair of insiders have reported that the Steelers are not expected to re-sign Wilson in free agency. There’s local Steelers reporter Dejan Kovacevic with a more scathing way of saying Wilson’s days in Pittsburgh are over:

I’ll keep this short and very much to the point: Russell Wilson’s not wanted by the Steelers.

Like, at all.

I had multiple conversations Thursday with people inside the team, all on my long drive up here to Manhattan to cover hockey, and the universal sentiment among them regarding the player who quarterbacked the offense to a five-loss collapse to close the season was this: Don’t try here what you tried in Denver upon that ugly exit from the Broncos after a public spat with Sean Payton, which was to blame others for your shortcomings.

Also this: There’s the door.

We’ll circle back on this in a second.

Then there’s national NFL insider Jay Glazer indicating that Wilson will be playing elsewhere.

The Steelers indicated that they would like to re-sign one of Wilson or Justin Fields but not both. It’d be unsurprising if they opted with the younger option with much fresher legs than Wilson, who will be 37 in November.

But let’s get back to Dejan’s report because there is a backstory here. Longtime Steelers reporter, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette’s Gerry Dulac, wrote earlier in the week that Steelers offensive coordinator Arthur Smith and Wilson clashed over the offensive philosophy. How bad did it get? Apparently after a 500+ yard performance and over 400 yards from Wilson in a 44-38 win against the Cincinnati Bengals, Wilson lost the freedom to audible out of Smith’s calls.

Multiple sources have told the Post-Gazette the offense lacked imagination and that the audibles and route adjustments Wilson was making at the line of scrimmage were creating a conflict with offensive coordinator Arthur Smith.

[…]

According to several sources, Smith did not want Wilson changing plays at the line of scrimmage, like he did in Cincinnati, and deviating from the game plan.

Wilson’s desire to attack with the pass and throw down the field clashed with Smith’s run-first mentality, causing philosophical friction between the two.

Pittsburgh failed to score more than 17 points in its final five games, something not seen in Steelers history since Chuck Noll’s rookie season, which ended in a 1-13 record. Wilson’s numbers were hardly catastrophic but the offense ceased to score or really do much of anything after the win over the Bengals.

Now let’s get back to Kovacecic’s report, which indicates that this is a story planted by Wilson’s team:

But I’m told that Wilson’s agents, part of his voluminous entourage, put forth that narrative, and they did so in an apparent attempt to either preserve his status in Pittsburgh or enhance the chance that another team might want him as a starter.

Enunciating every syllable: It won’t be here.

No chance.

None.

What actually occurred with Wilson, according to those same people inside the team, is that, as all of our naked eyes could plainly tell us, he wasn’t following the play calls, he was holding the ball way too long and, within the latter, he no longer could escape defenders in the backfield. I also heard internal concerns expressed — for the first time, I might add — about his arm strength. He just wasn’t good, aside from the odd prayer ball he’d heave up for George Pickens.

I’m not really sure where the arm strength concerns have come from given that’s the one thing he still does at a high level, but whatever. One thing that has happened is that three of Wilson’s five highest sack rates of his career have come in his post-Seahawks seasons. He’s not remotely the same rushing threat that he once was (understandably), which means that near-sacks that turned into magic are now just sacks.

We’ve also had this story before. Back in 2022, a story came out that Wilson wanted Brian Schottenheimer fired at the end of the 2020 season, which the Seahawks did. There was the much more public clashing between Sean Payton and Wilson when Russ was with the Denver Broncos, but that story was a lot different than just disagreeing over offensive philosophy and is more pointed at Denver’s decision to sit Wilson for injury guarantee money purposes. Now we’ve got this bit of drama in Pittsburgh, leading to a sour end after such a promising start.

On another note, Wilson received a second-placed vote from The Athletic’s Dianna Russini for AP Comeback Player of the Year.