The Pittsburgh Steelers offense certainly was explosive in 2014 as they produced 65 big plays of 20 or more yards during the regular season. On this Fourth of July, I thought we’d take a look back at a few of the fireworks produced by the offense last season by focusing in on their one triple explosive play and three quadruple explosive plays.
It shouldn’t come as a surprise that the Steelers “Killer B’s” were responsible for all of the plays that went for 60 yards or more in 2014. The first one came courtesy of running back Le’Veon Bell in the Week 3 game against the Carolina Panthers.
We’ve already broken this play down several times in the past, but it’s important to remind you to watch the great double-team blocking up front by the Steelers offensive line in addition to how Bell reads them. He also does a great job of setting up and reading Panthers linebacker Luke Kuechly, who is currently one of the best in the game. The play was good for 80 yards.
The Steelers next huge play of 60 yards or more unfortunately came in the loss against the New York Jets in Week 10. That 80 yard touchdown from quarterback Ben Roethlisberger to wide receiver Martavis Bryant, however, showed great improvisation on the behalf of both players. As only few quarterbacks in the league can do, Roethlisberger manages to escape a potential sack and then waits for Bryant to break his route up and across the field for the easy long pitch and catch.
In the Steelers first meeting last season against the Cincinnati Bengals in Week 14, the Roethlisberger to Bryant connection struck again for the team’s longest play from scrimmage of the season.
On that 1st and 10 fourth quarter play from the Steelers 6-yard-line, Bryant blows right by Bengals cornerback Leon Hall down the right side of the field and Roethlisberger throws a beautiful strike nearly 50 yards in the air to him after a play-action fake. 94 yards in total and it put the Bengals away for good.
The Steelers hit the Bengals up for one more huge play in the regular-season finale and this time it was wide receiver Antonio Brown who found the end zone after making a tremendous catch against cornerback Dre Kirkpatrick.
I am providing two gifs of this play below just to show you how incredible it was. It originally appears like it’s supposed to be a back-shoulder throw to Brown on 3rd and 8 but the receiver manages to get free over the top of the great coverage. When this pass was originally thrown, I thought for sure it would be picked off, but Brown instead turned into a 63-yard touchdown after almost being tripped up by Bryant.
