Plays of the Year: Bud Dupree strip-sacks Baker Mayfield

Steel City Underground presents “Plays of the Year” featuring the tops runs, catches, hits and everything else in-between from the Pittsburgh Steelers 2019 season.

The Pittsburgh Steelers made a home stand against the Cleveland Browns that would put to rest doubts as to whether the foes on Lake Erie would be able to sweep them during the 2019 season. The relationship between the two teams was already tumultuous due to the Week 11 meeting on Thursday Night Football, famous for the incident between Mason Rudolph and Myles Garrett near the completion of that game.

In Week 13, the Steelers defense was locked in and ready for revenge.

One of the biggest contributors to their success that afternoon was the play of Bud Dupree.

Dupree entered the game with seven sacks, 44 tackles (34 solo), two passes defensed, three forced fumbles and two fumble recoveries. After a nice outing against the Cincinnati Bengals, Dupree didn’t slow down when the Steelers hosted the Browns. In fact, of the five times the Steelers defense sacked Baker Mayfield in the game, Dupree was responsible for 1.5 sacks in the 20-13 win by Pittsburgh, including one strip-sack that was recovered by the Steelers.

With 4:57 left in the third quarter, Mayfield took the snap from the shotgun position. Double-teamed by both the tackle and guard, Dupree was able to swim through the protection as Mayfield moved to his left. Initially, Mayfield was able to move up and away from Dupree’s pressure but he ran into more Steelers defenders mixing it up with his offensive line – namely Vince Williams, T.J. Watt, and Cameron Heyward. As Mayfield hesitated, he was tackled from behind by Dupree and the ball was knocked loose.

At some point, Heyward ran down the field with the ball after the play was whistled dead and possession was given to Pittsburgh.

In the game, Dupree added six tackles (four solo) and added to a then career-best total of 8.5 sacks (he would finish with 11.5 for the season).