Behind the Steel Curtain
The Steelers’ hot start to the 2025 season continued on Sunday with a dominant 23-9 win over the rival Cleveland Browns. As always, there are plenty of takeaways to be had:
Heading into Sunday’s game, the Steelers were coming off a bye week and back at home. The Browns were coming off a trip overseas and preparing to play a rookie quarterback in his second career start.
You’d expect one team to look far more prepared and comfortable than the other, and that was exactly what happened.
Against the Browns, the Steelers returned to the heavy usage of their Darnell-Washington-and-extra-O-lineman jumbo package they saw so much success with against the Vikings in Week 4. The Browns were no doubt expecting it — it was the standout feature of Pittsburgh’s last game — but Steelers offensive coordinator Arthur Smith threw in a wrinkle on the first offensive play of the game, sneaking Washington downfield on a play-action fake for a 36-yard passing play off the team’s most run-first look.
Plus, Pittsburgh limited Myles Garrett to just two total tackles. Despite what some Steeler fans might argue, he’s a bona fide game wrecker — shutting him down is absolutely an achievement that requires plenty of preparation.
The Steelers also looked prepared on defense. In BTSC’s game preview, I wrote that Cleveland rookie running back Quinshon Judkins looked like the real deal in an otherwise underwhelming Browns offense.
So what did the Steelers do? They packed the line of scrimmage, limiting Judkins to 36 yards on 12 carries. Between the run game inefficiency and Pittsburgh’s early lead, the Browns had to make rookie quarterback Dillon Gabriel pass the ball a whopping 52 times. That was never going to be a winning strategy for Cleveland. But it sure was for Pittsburgh.
The Pittsburgh offense is bizarre in so many ways, but I’m not going to criticize it too much until it stops working.
On its most basic level, the Arthur Smith offense works when it can establish the run game. And for the last two weeks, Pittsburgh has managed to do exactly that.
The run blocking has taken a step forward (both Broderick Jones and Mason McCormick had some key plays in that area against Cleveland), and Jaylen Warren continues to prove that he’s a RB1-caliber player (his contact balance might be among the best in the league). Kenneth Gainwell and Kaleb Johnson have also each looked like capable runners in recent weeks.
But where the offense both struggles and succeeds is how it doesn’t utilize a traditional “WR2.” The Steelers’ passing offense has been up and down all season, but when Calvin Austin III was declared out ahead of the Browns game and the Steelers were down to names such as Roman Wilson and Scotty Miller on the depth chart, it didn’t affect their strategy much.
Instead, Arthur Smith has...
