{"id":641044,"date":"2026-03-08T13:46:16","date_gmt":"2026-03-08T13:46:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/641044\/"},"modified":"2026-03-08T13:46:16","modified_gmt":"2026-03-08T13:46:16","slug":"favoritism-beat-writer-explains-why-pat-freiermuth-had-snap-count-cut","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/641044\/","title":{"rendered":"‘Favoritism’: Beat Writer Explains Why Pat Freiermuth Had Snap Count Cut"},"content":{"rendered":"

Arthur Smith\u2019s affinity for tight ends is well known but his loyalty to one tight end in particular left many observers puzzled last season. In his second season as\u00a0 offensive coordinator, the Pittsburgh Steelers brought in Jonnu Smith as part of the Jalen Ramsey trade to be another contributor in a crowded tight end room. In retrospect, it was a bad move, and it\u2019s no surprise that Pittsburgh released Jonnu Smith just before the start of the new league year, especially given his historically bad 2025 production.<\/a><\/p>\n

Not only was he ineffective, but Jonnu Smith\u2019s role in the offense came at the expense of Pat Freiermuth, who had a drop-off in production despite being one of Pittsburgh\u2019s better pass catchers. Ray Fittipaldo of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette offered his thoughts on how this mess of a tight end situation came to be.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think some of that had to do with former offensive coordinator, Arthur Smith. He became enamored of Darnell Washington. Jonnu Smith played for him in Tennessee and Atlanta. So there was some favoritism there,\u201d Fittipaldo said on Sportline with George Von Benko on WMBS Radio<\/a>. \u201cI think that Arthur kind of wanted to get him involved and, let\u2019s be honest, it came at the expense of one of your highest paid players.\u201d<\/p>\n

Jonnu Smith was coming off a Pro Bowl 2024 season with the Miami Dolphins in which he registered 88 catches, 884 yards and 8 touchdowns. After trading away George Pickens, the lack of an obvious number two receiver made the acquisition of Smith logical, especially given Arthur Smith\u2019s penchant for multiple tight end sets.<\/p>\n

Arthur Smith\u2019s familiarity with Jonnu Smith made their reunion even more sensible. It became clear, though, that Jonnu Smith\u2019s number of snaps despite poor production came at Freiermuth\u2019s cost.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019re paying Pat Freiermuth 12 million dollars a year, and they didn\u2019t get production that a contract like that warrants last year,\u201d Fittipaldo continued. \u201cSo I think Mike McCarthy will do a much better job of getting him infused into the offense. Obviously, they have to add a couple of weapons at receiver, but once they do that, I think you\u2019ll see Freiermuth\u2019s production go way up.\u201d<\/p>\n

Contract aside, it became obvious last season that continuing to play Smith over Freiermuth made no sense as chemistry with Rodgers never developed. For that reason alone, it\u2019s fair to the role that favoritism played in Arthur Smith\u2019s decision making over personnel.<\/p>\n

With both Arthur Smith and Jonnu Smith out of the picture for 2026, it\u2019s safe to assume that Pat Freiermuth\u2019s talent will allow him to reclaim his status as Pittsburgh\u2019s top pass-catching tight end in Mike McCarthy\u2019s offense. Darnell Washington will have a role and a third tight end, possibly Connor Heyward on a new contract, will fill out the room. With a new coaching staff, the goal will be snaps will be based on merit and production\u00a0rather than familiarity and favoritism.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Arthur Smith\u2019s affinity for tight ends is well known but his loyalty to one tight end in particular…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":641045,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[39],"tags":[7952,272837,24896,1232,68433,1654,62,67,132,68,272838],"class_list":["post-641044","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nfl","tag-arthur-smith","tag-george-von-benko","tag-jonnu-smith","tag-nfl","tag-pat-freiermuth","tag-ray-fittipaldo","tag-sports","tag-united-states","tag-unitedstates","tag-us","tag-wmbs-radio"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/641044","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=641044"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/641044\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/641045"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=641044"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=641044"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=641044"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}