The regular season kicks off tomorrow, so before we get there I just wanted to tie a bow on the preseason. I already started doing so earlier today by wrapping up a couple of last film sessions in which I took a look at some of the fringe players who helped their cause and made the 53-man roster or the practice squad with late pushes, but I wanted to finish things off with a recap of the Pittsburgh Steelers’ preseason offensive charting notes.
- First of all, a simple snap count. Rookie quarterback Joshua Dobbs easily saw the most playing time from the position, playing 135 snaps over the course of the four games. Though he only dressed for the final two, veteran backup Landry Jones placed a distant second with 61 snaps, less than half that of Dobbs.
- The franchise guy, Ben Roethlisberger, only played two drives over the course of the whole preseason consisting of 16 plays. I believe that is roughly similar to the amount of playing time that he got last season, however, and he did not exactly come out of the gates rusty in Washington.
- Oh, and Bart Houston saw 41 snaps, only playing in the first two preseason games.
- Oddly enough, Terrell Watson and Knile Davis played exactly the same number of snaps—84. Given that, it would be hard to argue that the competition was not fair.
- Nobody saw more playing time among wide receivers than Sammie Coates with 110 snaps. it can’t be said that he wasn’t given a chance before he was traded.
- My top-secret favorite player, Chris Hubbard, saw time at both left and right tackle and wrapped things up at center. He did not get any work as a tackle-eligible—in fact, nobody did.
- As for Matt Feiler, he played damn near 200 snaps, more than anybody else, though he only played at left and right guard.
- Things tend to even out the broader the sample size, and we saw that with personnel groupings. The Steelers ended up playing out of 11 personnel about 62 percent of the time. The vast majority of the rest came from multiple-tight end sets, as they didn’t use Roosevelt Nix
- I probably shouldn’t be surprised, but play action remained in low-usage, just 21 of 149 dropbacks for a usage rate of about 14 percent.
- The Steelers averaged over four YAC per reception this preseason. They lost yards after the catch on four catches as well.
- The Steelers went 5-for-21 on deep passes for 187 yards and two touchdowns with an interception, averaging nine yards per attempt.
- On 37 carries, Terrell Watson had no explosive plays and just four runs of 10 or more yards. But he did not lose yardage once. Surprisingly, only 21 of his 37 carries were ‘successful’ plays.
- Of course, in contrast, only six of Davis’ 20 carries were successful.
- I know you’re waiting on the numbers for James Conner, so here they are: only 10 of 24 runs were successful.
