The Pittsburgh Steelers have been linked to Kirk Cousins throughout the offseason, and until now, it didn’t appear to be a realistic choice for them. But with the hire of Arthur Smith as offensive coordinator, the team could be setting themselves up to go make a splash with the Minnesota passer.

Cousins is going to be a big-ticket quarterback this spring, with a few teams likely in the hunt to land the four-time Pro Bowler. Whoever makes a move for Cousins is going to be looking at a major contract, even for a 36-year-old coming off an achilles injury. But with his resume and success in the NFL, he’ll have offers in free agency.

The Steelers have been named a potential landing spot by multiple publications, but their hiring of Smith makes former Pro Bowler Chris Long believe the team has the perfect setup to land Cousins.

“I think he’s a guy who Pittsburgh can look at,” Long said on the Green Light Podcast. “And I also wonder if this move is instructive to thinking maybe there’s a wild card kind of quarterback that they have in mind that they can acquire or go after. And maybe Kirk Cousins is that guy.”

Long’s reasoning is simple – with Smith as OC, there should be more play-action. And you want to know who led the league in play-action last season? Cousins and the Minnesota Vikings.

“He’s made a lot of his hay over the course of his career turning his back to the defense, gathering his feet, and delivering and firing downfield,” Long added.

The Steelers are expected to turn to their running game quite a bit under Smith, making play-action a new component they’ll be utilizing much more of. They also have plenty of weapons surrounding the quarterback, and maybe, just maybe, Cousins is ready to make some noise with them.

“I think Kirk Cousins, as his career has gone on, people have appreciated him more appropriately as maybe not an elite quarterback, but somebody you can definitely win with,” Long said. “And you can win with it if you have a run game. You can win with Kirk Cousins if play-action is part of the equation. And if you are Arthur Smith, I look at the Tennessee [Titans] model … You have your version of an A.J. Brown in George Pickens. I’m not saying he’s A.J. Brown, but I think he’s widely talented. And you have your version of Derrick Henry in Najee Harris. He’s not Derrick Henry, but you have a big bruising back and a very talented number one receiver, and I think he can look at the bones of this team and say ‘hey, we can win this way, with this formula.'”