Week 1 VS Browns Pregame

[ATL96Steeler]

Okay...week one is finally upon us!!!

Injury front...Martavious Bryant, Lance Moore, Bryce McCain, Cody Wallace were DNP yesterday so not likely to play....Spence, Warren, Spaeth were full participation...they should play.

Both Bell and Blount will play.

Steelers swept the series last year, both fairly comfortable wins. They were not able to pressure Ben much.

Game plan...well noted the Browns lost Gordon for the season, they did upgrade the RB spot with Tate...strong TE...Austin can play...Steelers have been vulnerable to the run, look for them to run to the left side behind Thomas/Greco...and playaction off that and take some shots deep @ Taylor.

For PIT on OFC...this will sound like a broken record as the season goes on, but G,C,G play must give Ben a pocket to step up into because I'm not real comfortable with our OTs to seal the edge...Taylor will be a tough match for Pouncey, so they might not be able to run up the middle well, but we still have to pound inside the OTs a bit to get the stretch plays to open up.

I think Archer will get quite a few touches from the slot with Moore out...look for him to break one.

Heyward vs Thomas...I don't like that matchup. but JJ is going to have to tackle his butt off and keep the play inside of him for Timmons to finish it off. The weaker side of the CLE line is where we have to attack I think...need Worilds and Thomas to have good games.

Vegas like us by 6 or so...I like PIT to win this game as well...24-17.

What say you!

 

[FaCe-LeE-uS]

Typical AFCN game… Battle will be won or lost in the trenches. CLE will look to expose the run defense, so McLendon will be in the spotlight. If he can't demand that double team or beat his man often, then Timmons & Shazier are going to have to deal with blockers on the 2nd level. Shazier vs. Cameron is going to be a battle to watch outside of the D-line. On the opposite side of the ball the AB vs. Haden matchup will likely take a backseat this year because of the total firepower this offense has. I expect Ben to primarily run from the no huddle, but I'd like to see them set the tone early by pounding the ball between the tackles.

I think PIT is too highly motivated to fall flat again so I expect a pummeling. The offense is going to carry this one, even against a tough defense. It will force CLE to give up the run game, no matter how successful they are with it.

Prediction: 28-13 PIT

 

[FaCe-LeE-uS]

RECAP...

O... Obviously night & day from the first half to the next. But the offense took care of business when it counted most, thanks to CLE's inability to come up big when the time comes lol. Let's just focus on the 1st half shall we? Ben set a new franchise record for passing yards in 1 half of football. Aside from the INT, he looked like a man on a mission! My only concern is pass protection. Both Beachum & Gilbert had nights to forget. Especially Gilbert. He looked lost, Mike-Adams-lost. Munchak has work to do! The WR's looked great as well. All came up with clutch catches throughout the game, but none more so than Wheaton's catch to set up the game winning FG. Definition of clutch! But the catch down the sideline in the 2nd was a thing of beauty as well! AB was... well... AB... He sent Joe Haden back to high school. Le'Veon looks poised ot put up huge numbers this season. Over 200 all purpose yards, almost 100 yards receiving on top of his 100+yards on the ground. BEAST! His cutting ability in space made a fool out of a lot of defenders. Blount added some good tough yards in critical situations. Obviously the offense didn't do much in the 2nd half. I was scratching my head at some of the playcalling, so maybe Haley shares some of the blame. Or maybe they forgot about those other 2 quarters of play alltogether. Regardless, they need to finish stronger than they start. They've been preaching all week about "starting fast" but I think they went a little overboard with that. They blew their collective load on 2 quarters of football lol. If they can piece it together for 4 quarters then look out... This team is easily #2 in the AFC.

D... Just like the offense, they started strong and finished weak. They held the Brownies to 101 yards of offense in the 1st half. It is what should be expected facing a B-team offense. But that same offense stormed the field and scored an unanswered 24 points in the 2nd half. Heyward & Worilds had nice sacks. Taylor had a pretty awful game. 15 yard penalty, dropped INT (typical), allowed a TD. McLendon was abused. If I am Lebeau I would be putting some serious thought into putting Thomas at NT, even McCullers. And how about William Gay??? Didn't see that coming! When the defense needed a big play at a crucial moment, he batted a pass and stuffed a screen pass. Love it!

ST... Wing had an OK night. Definitely would have liked to see some better placement. Archer made a terrible decision on a return. That hesitation on a short fielded kickoff is never going to give him a chance. Hopefully someone slapped the back of his helmet after that. Chalk it up to a rookie mistake. I almost pissed myself on AB's punt return from laughter. I heard just about every announcer & analyst collectively say "I've never seen that before". Talking about the front kick after a failed hurdle. That will make the "Not-so-top-10" list. Great return though! Suisham stole the show with the game winner of course.

SUMMARY... Gotta find a better level of consistency on both sides of the football. If that were any team other than the Browns, they would be 0-1 right now. The 1st game of the season is always a little surprising in that nobody has any tape on their opponents so nobody knows what to expect. So maybe the Browns deserve a little credit, but I still think the Steelers need to finish stronger than that. Let's hope that this weeks motto is "Finish Strong" instead of last week's "Start Fast".

 

[ATL96Steeler]

Good summary and spot on.

My thoughts.

1st off...kudos to the Browns...they could've folded up the tent and chalked up a loss on the road...whatever the HC said to say at the half, Tomlin needs to buy a half dz from him for future reference.

Looking thru the in game thread comments this morning I had the same roller coaster ride of emotions, but at the half I told my brother-n-law that CLE would make a run...I just didn't expect a near collapse for PIT.

DEF...DL vs the run was awful...nearly every RB that got a handoff got to the 2nd level of the DEF and tackling was not great when they got there....I saw that in preseason....that ground success opened up the playaction to get behind the LBs..., can't really fault Timmons/Shazier much...that's textbook football there.

DL vs the pass wasn't that bad imo...in addition to the 2 sacks you mentioned, JJ had one, Keisel and C. Thomas both had TFL...Hoyer felt pressure...if stones for hand Ike holds on to an easy pick maybe it wouldn't have been as much drama...same for Allen and Gay...they dropped picks too I thought.

OFC...OT play has to be a little better than that, especially Gilbert...the good was the interior of the OL gave Ben a pocket to step up into and which I thought was mandatory for him to have a good game...run blocking was pretty good...Bell is unorthodox with his hesitation but clearly has a game plan to his running style...his patience is scary but effective...WRs played well including J. Brown.

Hopefully Archer & S. Thomas are fine for this week...Ravens will be pumped after losing their opener.

 

[FaCe-LeE-uS]

Good summary!

DEF... I knew I was forgetting a sack in there somewhere. JJ looked stout. I thought Shazier made some great penetration, even on plays that went away from him. Tackling does need to improve. But I think once they get better D-line play it will make a world of difference. All 3 of those drops by the CBs were catchable. Definitely would have changed things in the 2nd half.

OFF... Gilbert made a great run block to seal the d-lineman on Blount's TD. That was about the only highlight that he had. CLE has some good DEs, but not the best in the league. Hopefully they get that shored up on this short week. Or else Suggs & Dumerville are going to have a great game.

The Ravens are going to be even more pumped because they will NOT want to start the season off 0-2 in the DIVISION, no less the league.

 

[ATL96Steeler]

JJ...yes, he looked a lot better...just missed a TFL and Keisel had a QB hit, not a TFL, but Hoyer felt it I'm sure.

Ravens...the Browns OL played stout in the 2nd half...it's copycat league so we can assume BAL will follow that same game plan this week to pound it to pull Timmons and Shazier up and get behind them with Pitta and deep crossing patterns with Smith.

I'm not certain the BAL OL is of the same caliber as CLE...C to LT is very good in CLE...interesting that they right a lot though.

I think we both felt the DEF was going to have its learning curve under fire and I think we'll see more of that learning curve as the year goes on but repeating the same mistakes I have a low tolerance for of my own job performance so we'll see how it goes....more on them in a day or so.

Wheaton...I see it now...Sanders had a great catch last night, near horizontal to snare one, but not the top end speed of Wheaton.

A.B.. not sure what he was thinking...one cut to the sideline and he gets 6...seems like he wanted to punish the punter after he realized he wasn't going to hurdle him.

 

[FaCe-LeE-uS]

Saw the Sanders catch as well. I'm sure that gave Elway the warm & fuzzies that he was hoping for. Is it just me, or does Sanders look like he is playing with more of an edge? Almost as if he finally figured out that he needs to step up, in primetime spotlight no less lol. We saw glimpses of it during his few years here, but never what he showed last night. Still runs sloppy routes though, but nobody needs to be a perfectionist when you have Peyton Manning throwing the ball. I saw him doggin it on a few plays that went away from him, which was typical. He should produce some good numbers if he stays healthy.

I still think letting Wheaton step up was the right decision. He is more than capable of filling those shoes while he progresses. Wheaton is already the same, if not better, than Sanders was. He looks like a more polished product though. Lets hope that he continues to show up big!

AB... Yea I'm not even going to attempt to guess at what he was thinking with the hurdle. The punter was already falling backwards as if he knew he was about to get his ankles twisted. AB would have easily got around him if he tried. Nevertheless, the comedy that the drop kick produced was priceless. I think I only rewinded that moment 20+ times to get the full effect.