1. Peer pressure
The Pittsburgh Steelers didn’t have to fool anyone to pressure the opposing quarterback in Week 1. Their Week 2 opponent took the opposite approach in their opener.
While only two of the 32 teams on NFL opening weekend blitzed less frequently than the Steelers in their win at Atlanta, no team blitzed more frequently than the Denver Broncos in their Sept. 8 loss at Seattle. According to pro-football-reference.com, the Broncos had the highest blitz percentage in Week 1 at 42.9%, tied with Las Vegas. The Steelers blitzed Atlanta’s Kirk Cousins on just 10.7% of his dropbacks, a higher rate than only Houston (8.3%) and San Francisco (9.7%) in their opening games.
Why did the Steelers deny their “Blitzburgh” identity? Simply put, because they didn’t have to. According to Sharp Football Analysis, the Steelers had the second-best pressure rate in Week 1 of any NFL player when not flash.
Putting pressure on quarterbacks is always a priority, but in the case of Sunday’s quarterback duel, it’s even more important. When pressured last week in his NFL debut in Seattle, Broncos quarterback Bo Nix was awful: 7 of 15 for 20 yards and one interception for 1.3 yards per pass attempt.
Steelers quarterback Justin Fields fared better under pressure in Week 1: 2 of 3 for 49 yards with a scramble and two sacks. But last season, when he played for Chicago, Fields had the third-worst yards per attempt (5.1) under pressure among all quarterbacks who played at least 10 games
2. Picking Pickens
A central theme during the Steelers’ offseason and training camp was the apparent lack of alternatives in the receiver group to free up the new number 1 player George Pickens.
Week 1 did little to dispel this impression.
Among the wide receivers, Pickens was responsible for seven of the 11 targeted throws and a whopping 91% of the receiving yards gained. Even when including the tight ends (but not running backs), Pickens was responsible for 63% of the Steelers’ passing yards gained against the Falcons.
But when you analyze the percentage of throws to Pickens compared to everyone else on the Steelers offense last week based on targeted air yards, the discrepancy becomes even more apparent. According to Next Gen Stats, balls thrown to Pickens accounted for 75.2% of the distance covered by all 23 of Fields’ passes. That was by far the highest percentage for any pass catcher in the NFL in Week 1.
The general perception that Pickens is the Steelers’ only real threat on big plays has borne out in the season opener. According to Pro Football Focus, Pickens ranked fourth in yards per route run (3.86) among all NFL wide receivers targeted at least four times in Week 1.
3. Take your time
Since entering the league in 2021, Fields has consistently ranked at or near the bottom of Next Gen’s average throw time metric. As a rookie, his 2.91-second average from snap to pass attempt was sixth-longest, then in 2022 it was fourth-longest at 3.12 seconds, and last season’s 3.23-second average throw time was by far the longest in the league.
In his debut for the Steelers last week, Fields again earned attention for holding onto the ball much longer than the average passer. At 3.06 seconds, only three quarterbacks had a longer average time to throw in Week 1.
This tendency can undoubtedly lead to positive results at times and can sometimes measure a quarterback’s ability to improvise and make plays, but it also correlates with the fact that Fields has suffered 137 sacks since entering the league, the most in the NFL.
4. All or nothing
The raw stats say that seven of Najee Harris’ 20 carries in Atlanta cost 2 or fewer yards and three costs more than 5 yards. But Next Gen’s analysis identifies one (in the site’s language) “remarkable run” — and 19 other mostly run-of-the-mill runs.
Harris’ 20-yard run, the highest of the game, early in the fourth quarter was 16 rush yards over average expected value (RYOE) – a formula designed to represent how much a running back over- or under-performs on a run. But Harris’ other 19 runs combined for minus-10 RYOE.
If Harris had only made that one long run, he would have been among the top eight RYOE running backs in the NFL in Week 1. But … if he had only made all 19 of the other he would have the 10.-worst RYOE for the opening weekend.
Chris Adamski is a TribLive reporter who has covered primarily the Pittsburgh Steelers since 2014 after covering Penn State football for two seasons. A native of Western Pennsylvania, he joined the Trib in 2012 after covering Pittsburgh sports for other media outlets for a decade. He can be reached at [email protected].
