Photo: steelers.com
The Pittsburgh Steelers didn’t leave much doubt about Sunday’s outcome, cruising to a 27-6 victory over the Cleveland Browns and extending their winning streak to four games. While the final score was impressive, there were several developments throughout the afternoon that deserve a closer look.
Some were encouraging, others were unusual, and a few highlighted areas where Pittsburgh still has work to do. Here are the biggest surprises from the Steelers’ latest victory.
Third-and-13 isn’t exactly the situation where most teams expect to hand the football to their running back and pick up a first down. Apparently, nobody told Jaylen Warren.
With Pittsburgh facing third-and-13 from its own 24-yard line in the first quarter, Warren took a handoff up the middle and exploded for 51 yards to the Cleveland 25. The play kept alive a possession that eventually covered 86 yards and ended with a Chris Boswell field goal.
Warren finished with 143 yards on 17 carries, averaging an incredible 8.4 yards per attempt. He also scored on a one-yard touchdown run in the third quarter, continuing an impressive stretch for Pittsburgh’s rushing attack.
The Steelers have been searching for more explosive plays on offense, and Warren provided several of them without Rodgers having to throw the football downfield.
Of all the ways Pittsburgh could have scored before halftime, a direct snap to Pat Freiermuth probably wasn’t near the top of anyone’s list.
With five seconds remaining and the ball at Cleveland’s one-yard line, Rodgers lined up in shotgun before Freiermuth took the direct snap and powered into the end zone. The touchdown gave Pittsburgh a 20-6 halftime lead and capped a six-play, 69-yard drive that took just 44 seconds.
Freiermuth also contributed two receptions for 35 yards, including a 28-yard catch that helped set up the touchdown.
His rushing score was a creative wrinkle from an offense that has occasionally struggled to finish drives near the goal line: it wasn’t the conventional way to score, but it certainly worked.
Washington has become an increasingly important part of Pittsburgh’s offense, but his performance against Cleveland was still something of a surprise. The massive tight end caught three passes for 94 yards, leading the team in receiving yards despite having only three targets.
His biggest contribution came in the third quarter, when Rodgers found him for a 58-yard gain that carried the football from Pittsburgh’s 41-yard line to Cleveland’s one. Warren scored on the following play, extending the Steelers’ lead to 27-6.
Washington’s ability to turn a relatively simple completion into an explosive gain gives Pittsburgh another dimension offensively. With defenses paying attention to Metcalf and the running game, the tight end is becoming a difficult matchup to ignore.
One of the more surprising statistics from Sunday’s game was Metcalf’s lack of production. Pittsburgh’s top wide receiver finished with just one reception for four yards on six targets, despite playing the majority of the offensive snaps.
Rodgers attempted only 25 passes, and the Steelers clearly leaned on their running game, but Metcalf’s limited involvement is still worth noting. Cleveland’s defense prevented him from making the kind of explosive plays that have helped Pittsburgh in previous games.
Rodgers had one attempt, a long bomb, ricochet off of Metcalf’s hands and body before being intercepted by the Browns. In all, it was a disappointing afternoon for the team’s WR1.
The encouraging part is that the Steelers didn’t need a big afternoon from their top receiver to win by three touchdowns. However, finding ways to get Metcalf more involved should remain a priority as the season progresses.
One of the more unusual moments occurred following Rico Dowdle‘s first-quarter touchdown. During the extra-point attempt, Mason McCormick body slammed Browns defensive lineman Jared Verse, drawing a 15-yard unnecessary roughness penalty that was enforced on the ensuing kickoff.
Steelers tackle Troy Fautanu later defended his teammate, explaining that McCormick regularly dumps defenders who attempt to jump over the offensive line.
Former NFL offensive lineman Jason Pinkston also supported McCormick’s actions, describing the technique as something offensive linemen are taught from the beginning.
In actuality, it was a likely blown call by the officials, who missed Verse using leverage on the Steelers lineman: which itself is a penalty and would have avoided the situation had the Browns defender not tried to gain an unfair advantage in the first place!
The penalty didn’t change the outcome, but it certainly added another chapter to the conversation surrounding Pittsburgh’s increasingly physical offensive line.
Perhaps the biggest surprise was just how thoroughly Pittsburgh kept Cleveland off the scoreboard. The Browns finished with 326 gross passing yards and 319 net yards of total offense, yet managed only two field goals.
Cleveland reached the red zone three times without scoring a touchdown, including a fourth-quarter possession that reached Pittsburgh’s two-yard line before the Steelers forced a turnover on downs at the five.
More surprising was Cleveland using timeouts at the very end of the game to attempt to score “garbage time” points as the clock wound to zero. This low brow attempt would also fall short, as an illegal shift penalty and no more timeouts to use caused a runoff of time which officially end the game.
Despite that drive, even when the Browns moved the football, Pittsburgh’s defense found ways to finish possessions. Eight sacks, two takeaways and a dominant performance against the run helped ensure Cleveland never seriously threatened the Steelers’ lead.
Sunday’s victory offered plenty of encouraging developments, from Warren’s explosive rushing performance to Washington’s emergence as a receiving threat. It also featured some memorable moments, including Freiermuth’s unconventional touchdown and McCormick’s controversial penalty.
The Steelers weren’t perfect, but they didn’t have to be. With a four-game winning streak and a 6-2 record heading into the bye week, Pittsburgh has plenty of positives to build on before returning to action.
