Steelers' Danny Smith Set Up Rookie Kaleb Johnson For Failure And Here's The Proof

The Pittsburgh Steelers' Week 2 contest against the Seattle Seahawks wasn’t going great, but they had a chance until rookie Kaleb Johnson made a grave mistake. Johnson didn’t seem to know the rule and touched the ball as it landed in the landing zone, then failed to secure it. The Seahawks were able to fall on the football for an easy, game altering score. From there, the Steelers couldn’t recover and suffered a 31-17 loss. After the game, Johnson addressed the play, taking accountability and saying all the right things. Still, the reality is simple, he’s a rookie who made a costly mistake that completely shifted the momentum.

While mistakes are part of a young player’s development, the bigger question lies in why Johnson was put in that situation to begin with. Kick return duties are high pressure assignments that demand awareness, decisiveness, and experience. Putting an untested rookie in that role raised eyebrows, especially when Pittsburgh had other players on the roster who could have been trusted with the job. 

Special Teams Coordinator Danny Smith, who has long been respected as a football lifer and energetic presence, is now facing scrutiny for his decision making. The outcome of this play was not just about Johnson’s inexperience, it was about questionable coaching judgment.

For a Steelers team that cannot afford to beat itself, errors like this are magnified. A special teams lapse turned a winnable game into a double digit defeat, and that kind of breakdown reflects poorly on the entire unit, not just the rookie. Johnson will likely learn from the mistake and grow, but the Steelers need to be smarter about who they trust in critical roles. If Pittsburgh wants to avoid similar disasters in the future, they must ensure that responsibility matches readiness. Otherwise, the same issues will continue to derail games that should be competitive until the end.

When doing some research into Johnson’s college stats at Iowa, Steeler Nation gets furious upon finding out that Johnson returned just two kicks in the 2023 college football season. He returned zero in 2024 and 13 kicks in 2022. In total, across three seasons in college, Johnson returned only 15 kicks, with 13 of them coming in one year. That is not nothing, but it is also far from meaningful experience. Now it is 2025, and this is the NFL. The Steelers have plenty of other reliable options with more experience who know the rules and can be trusted in those moments.

Steelers' Danny Smith Has To Be Called Out For Special Teams Mistake

It was always clear why the Steelers drafted him in the third round, and it had nothing to do with kick returns. He was selected because of his natural talent as a running back, not as a special teams weapon. That does not mean the Steelers cannot experiment and see if Johnson might develop into a capable returner, but if they were going to put him back there, then the coaching staff had a responsibility to make sure he knew every single rule and scenario inside and out.

Smith, along with the rest of the staff, failed in that regard. Johnson clearly did not know the rule, and it ended up being a decisive factor in Pittsburgh losing its second game of the season. For a team trying to compete in a brutal AFC North race, those kinds of coaching lapses are unacceptable and must be corrected before they cost even more games.

How much blame do you place on Kaleb Johnson, and how much blame do you place on Danny Smith for what happened on that muffed kick return? Let us know in the comments below! Please feel free to share your Steelers takes with me on X @anthonyghalkias and follow me.

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