1.No depth
Ben Roethlisberger was successful in completing just one of his 14 pass attempts of 10 or more yards downfield during this past Monday’s Pittsburgh Steelers loss to the Cincinnati Bengals. That continued a recent trend of struggles for the veteran quarterback when throwing downfield.
According to game charts compiled by the NFL’s Next Gen Stats arm, Roethlisberger’s poor downfield outing against the Bengals dropped him to 4 for 24 over his past two games and 15 for 47 over his past four games on passes to targets least 10 yards beyond the line of scrimmage.
Pro Football Focus measures passing 20 or more yards downfield, designating that as “deep.” Roethlisberger’s adjusted completion percentage (which gives credit to passers for dropped balls) is 31.4% on passes 20-plus yards downfield. That ranks him 27th among 29 quarterbacks who have at least 26 attempts that deep. His passer rating on those defined deep throws (73.2) is 24th. And among all NFL QBs only Drew Lock (six) has thrown more interceptions in such instances.
WHAT TO DO WHAT TO DO??? 3rd down we need 10 yards or we lose the game, what do we call?
let’s send em deep and wave em to go deeper, then under throw the man 40 yards downfield in quadruple coverage pic.twitter.com/YGL93DkhFK
— Warren Sharp (@SharpFootball) December 22, 2020
2. Up-the-middle blues
No team in the NFL has a worse per-carry average on rushing plays deemed “up the middle’ than the Steelers. The league’s official statistics designate each carry by its direction: around the left or right end, off each side’s tackle or guard and up the middle. The Steelers are averaging 3.09 yards on 78 such plays.
With the second-worst rushing attack in the league, it should come as little surprise the Steelers also rate poorly at some other directional areas – they’re 29th in average gain around the left end (4.17) and 30th when running at the right guard (2.91).
It might therefore seem odd that the Steelers have what is the NFL’s best per-carry average rushing around right end. But that 7.11 average on 36 carries is explained by a pair of anomalies: wide receiver Ray-Ray McCloud’s end-around 58-yard carry during a Week 5 win against the Philadelphia Eagles, and James Conner breaking a 59-yard run during the final 2 minutes of a Week 2 win when the Denver Broncos were selling out for a stop or a turnover. Take away those two plays, and the Steelers’ average carry around right end drops to 4.09.
Steelers now 24 for 41 this season on 3rd-and-1 or 4th-and-1
— Chris Adamski (@C_AdamskiTrib) December 22, 2020
3. First down woes
It is by no means a requirement to get a first down on a first-and-10, and quite frankly it shouldn’t even be expected. But the Steelers offense has been worse than most when it comes to picking up a cheap, quick first down in moving the sticks on first-and-10.
The Steelers have done so 55 times in 355 chances, only about 15% of the time. Just three teams have fewer first downs from a first-and-10 rush and only six teams have fewer first downs that resulted from a first-and-10 pass. The Steelers have 13 and 41 such plays, respectively.
No one, during a given week, can tell you who is the “No. 1” or “No. 2” or even “No. 3” or “No. 4” wide receiver for the Steelers.
“You just never know,” JuJu Smith-Schuster said Sunday, “whose turn it is to ball every week.” https://t.co/isF3yWJxO5— Tribune-ReviewSports (@TribSports) October 26, 2020
4. The best?
Until their recent spate of drops, anecdotally there is a narrative that the Steelers have among the best wide receivers corps in the NFL. But, at least according to some of the objective and subjective analytics, that does not appear to be the case.
PFF’s yards per route run is a handy, simple and encompassing statistic for receivers. The Steelers top four WRs rank 22nd (Chase Claypool), 51st (Diontae Johnson), 82nd (James Washington) and 91st (JuJu Smith-Schuster) in that category among NFL wide receivers.
In PFF’s more subjective grades, Claypool is 38th, Johnson 65th, Smith-Schuster 76th and Washington 93rd.
Footballoutsiders.com’s go-to metric for evaluating player value is DYAR (defense-adjusted yards above replacement). Among 78 qualifiers with enough targets, Johnson is 77th, Smith-Schuster 63rd, Washington 59th and Claypool 39th.
Hey, Steelers Nation, get the latest news about the Pittsburgh Steelers here.
Chris Adamski is a Tribune-Review staff writer. You can contact Chris by email at cadamski@triblive.com or via Twitter .
Categories: Sports | Steelers/NFL
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