PITTSBURGH (93.7 The Fan) – Diontae Johnson admits he was ‘frustrated a little bit’ Sunday at Cleveland and said he will make his relationship right at practice with quarterback Kenny Pickett.
“Stuff like that happens,” Johnson said Monday. “I can’t fault him (Pickett) for that. He’s not perfect, I can’t sit here and blame him. I’m not pointing fingers at nobody. I was frustrated, but you can’t just sit here and blame him. It’s part of the game.”
“They got to get on the same page,” said quarterback Mitch Trubisky. “I know what happened. I’m not going to disclose what happened. They got to get on the same page. I’m not going to say who is at fault. When a play doesn’t work, it’s everybody’s fault including me and everyone on this team.”
Trubisky talked on Monday as Pickett wasn’t available. Johnson said the film doesn’t lie. If you watch it, he says there are times he is open and not getting the ball. He admits he just needs to keep playing, but the emotions were riding him, even with Mike Tomlin on the sidelines on Sunday.
“It’s frustrating because we know how good we are,” Johnson said. “To just keep starting out the game how we started and we see we aren’t progressing. What do we do? We just keep playing, that’s all you can do. You can’t look for any excuses. We just got to play better.”
Pickett said after the game Sunday there were some miscommunications and that can’t happen. They have to get it ironed out and at the end of the game wasn’t the first time. Both admitted it’s concerning that those issues are happening 10 games into a season.
Trubisky said Monday you have to channel emotion in the right way.
“We just got to all buy in and point the thumb at yourself and look in the mirror and say how I can get better,” Trubisky said. “How can I help my teammates on the sidelines?”
“We just weren’t on the same page. That’s why we missed on a couple of those. Couldn’t connect on any big shots down the field and it hurt our offense. Complaining about it is not going to do anything. We just got to lock in and focus and think about how can we fix this? How can we get better?”
“Obviously, we got to play better,” Johnson said. “It starts at practice and builds towards Sunday.”
Practice begins Wednesday for another huge AFC North game in Ohio.