Dallas Cowboys’ collapse against the Arizona Cardinals on Sunday, giving away a 14-point fourth-quarter lead and losing 33-30, was difficult enough to explain. But as the Cowboys tried to process another fourth-quarter meltdown, footage of George Pickens sprinting toward the locker room became another talking point.

Skip Bayless saw more than an unusual exit in the clip, calling it a warning sign and revisiting why Mike Tomlin’s Pittsburgh Steelers had decided to move on from the wide receiver.

How George Pickens Left the Field After the Cowboys’ Collapse

Dallas went ahead 24-10 when Dak Prescott ran in from 5 yards out 40 seconds into the fourth quarter. Arizona answered with three touchdown passes from Gardner Minshew II over the rest of regulation.

The last was a 13-yard throw to Michael Wilson with 6 seconds left, and Chad Ryland won it on a 42-yard field goal with 2:53 left in overtime. The loss dropped the Cowboys to 3-5.

The Cardinals’ rally came through the air, and Pro Football Network posted on X that Dallas tops its list of “the worst pass defense grades in the NFL.” PFN’s NFL team defense Impact Grade has the Cowboys’ pass defense at 60.6, nearly 5 points below the next-worst New Orleans Saints, at 65.4.

Pickens, meanwhile, saw little of the ball all afternoon. Prescott threw only 29 passes as Dallas ran it 39 times, and Pickens caught two of his four targets for 48 yards, one of them a 37-yarder. CeeDee Lamb, by comparison, was targeted 11 times and finished with seven catches for 58 yards.

Then came the viral clip of his exit, which caught Pickens running quickly past fans in a luxury-area walkway, the route Dallas players take to their locker room at AT&T Stadium, at about the moment of the winning kick. Fox Sports’ NFL account shared the footage on Sunday night with a question of its own: “How did he get there so fast?”

Speaking after the loss on “Gridiron” with Aqib Talib, Bayless called the Cowboys “a bad football team with weak coaching.” He then turned to Pickens and linked his rush to the locker room with the Steelers’ decision to move on from him.

Bayless gave his take on both issues: “You can say it’s just on the players, but George Pickens — they don’t feature him. They threw him four balls all day. And you see, he just ran off the field. I think it was almost before the final field goal. He just ran up the tunnel as fast as he could.”

Bayless added, “He’s going to be a problem because…” then circled back to when Pickens left, and from there to Pickens’ former head coach in Pittsburgh: “They said it was while the guy was lining up to kick the field goal. He just took off running. But whatever… It’s why Mike Tomlin said no to him.”

How Mike Tomlin Explained the Steelers’ Decision on Pickens

The Steelers traded Pickens to Dallas before the 2025 season. Mike Tomlin, the former Pittsburgh head coach, now with NBC Sports, explained the thinking during an appearance on “The Rich Eisen Show,” two months before Sunday’s loss.

“If they’re developing in the right ways, if they fit your long-range plans, then you do second contract business with them. It didn’t happen for us with [Pickens]… But it doesn’t necessarily mean he’s not gonna be a spectacular player,” Tomlin had said.

“I think he’s already proven that to a certain degree with his first year in Dallas. But there’s also been something that’s stopped Dallas from making that long-term commitment to him as well. I think he still has something to prove,” Tomlin added.

That first year brought 93 catches, 1,429 receiving yards, and nine touchdowns, with his yardage third in the NFL, and Dallas had placed the franchise tag on him for 2026.

When host Rich Eisen followed up, Tomlin explained Pittsburgh’s side of it. “For us, I just thought, it’s not only play. It’s development in other areas, intangible areas. I think when you’re a high-dollar, second-contract guy. I think there’s some leadership responsibilities, and things of that nature… I just don’t feel like that was in his natural wheelhouse.”

Pickens is playing this season on that tag, with 39 catches for 533 yards through Week 8, 15th in the NFL in receiving yards. That leaves Dallas facing the same long-term question Pittsburgh once faced with Pickens after using the franchise tag to keep him for 2026.