Behind the Steel Curtain
Perhaps next May, when the schedule is released, the Steelers can just tell the NFL to give them a loss on their Thursday night game to save us all the trouble.
Pittsburgh is now 4-2 after a 33-31 loss to the Cincinnati Bengals, and they are staring a second straight loss in the face when they host the Green Bay Packers in Week 8 – if only they had taken advantage of a Bengals team without Joe Burrow and Trey Hendrickson. There’s a lot to get through, though, so let’s get into winners and losers.
Rodgers had his second game of the season with four touchdown passes and was in control for four quarters. A poorly-timed deep ball to DK Metcalf that was picked off does deserve acknowledgement, but the second pick was more of a great play by D.J. Turner than it was a bad throw by Rodgers. The four-time MVP had multiple touchdowns off extended plays. The first was to Jonnu Smith when he had north of eight seconds to throw. The second was a 68-yarder to Pat Freiermuth to give the Steelers the lead late in the fourth quarter. Rodgers certainly isn’t what’s wrong with the Steelers; he’s everything right about them.
Good for No. 88. After his playing time went down due to Darnell Washington becoming a focal point of the offense, many were saying the Steelers should find a trade partner for the Penn State product. However, he caught five passes for 111 yards and two second-half touchdowns that should have propelled the Steelers to a win.
Warren was tremendous on Thursday. He had 127 yards on the ground and averaged nearly eight yards per carry, and added 31 yards on four receptions. His explosiveness in the run game is what the Steelers’ offense runs through, and this was his best showing of the season.
When the Steelers bring Spencer Anderson on the field along with Darnell Washington for their jumbo package, their offense is nearly unstoppable. They utilized Anderson and Washington in motion as blockers multiple times to get a running start against the defense, and it proved to work very well. The more the Steelers use this, the better.
Aside from Broderick Jones nearly killing Rodgers by celebrating a little too hard, the Steelers’ offensive line was great. Rodgers had multiple touchdown passes on plays in which he had more than seven seconds to throw, and he wasn’t sacked for the second straight week. Additionally, the Steelers had 147 yards on the ground. The offensive line is coming into its own.
Smith is getting himself in head coach conversations with the work he has done with this offense. The Steelers are 10th in points per game and eighth in EPA per play, and he had the offense rolling against the Bengals. Pittsburgh was 7-of-10 on third downs, had just...
