Steelers 2019 Defensive Charting: First Eight Weeks

Updated charting for the Pittsburgh Steelers’ defense through the first half of the season. We’ll revisit these numbers in another four weeks.

– Excluding “no plays” (like false start and other pre-snap penalties) and kneeldowns, the defense has been on the field for 550 snaps in 2019. That puts them on pace for exactly 1100 by year’s end, a slightly better pace than where they were at after the first month (on pace for 1156 at that point) but would still be the second most defensive snaps since we began charting in 2014. They had 1102 in 2015.

– Here are the breakdowns by personnel grouping.

Nickel: 54.2%
3-4: 28.7%
Dime: 11.1%
1-5-5: 3.5%
3-5: 2.4%
Goal Line: 0.2%

Combining nickel and dime, they’ve been in sub-package 65.3% of the time. That’s down – slightly – from 68.4% in 2018. Dime is still way down, used about two-thirds less of the time as last year (37.2%). Better depth and talent at ILB is the catalyst for that in addition to lack of safety depth.

Pittsburgh has used their “over” front on 20 snaps, 3.6% of the time.

– Keith Butler has blitzed 32% of the time this season. He was at 35.6% through the first four weeks. So down a bit over the last month.

He is sending 5+ rushers 32.4% of the time this year.

– Let’s look at the numbers by position group.

Defensive Line

Pressures

Cam Heyward: 15
Stephon Tuitt: 13
Javon Hargrave: 6
Daniel McCullers: 3
Tyson Alualu: 3
Isaiah Buggs: 0

And snaps per pressure. Lower the number, the better.

Tuitt: 12.5
McCullers: 12.7
Heyward: 16.6
Hargrave: 27.3
Alualu: 35.3

Heyward and Hargrave have both improved on their pressure rates since the first month of the season.

Linebackers

Pressures

TJ Watt: 26
Bud Dupree: 18
Vince Williams: 4
Mark Barron: 3
Ola Adeniyi: 3
Devin Bush: 1
Anthony Chickillo: 1

And snaps per pressure.

Barron: 7
Williams: 7.3
Adeniyi: 7.6
Watt: 10.3
Dupree: 15.6
Bush: 17
Chickillo: 29

Weirdly enough, Dupree actually has a worse pressure rate than last year (13.8) but he’s finishing his chances so much more often. Watt continues to put up crazy good numbers while Barron and Williams have gotten free on this B gap, ILB blitzes. Adeniyi has a pretty pressure rate but those three pressures came within the first three weeks.

– Drop/coverage rates for Watt and Dupree.

Watt: 10.4%
Dupree: 11.1%

Numbers staying low for these guys going backwards. They’re playing well but not being asked to drop into coverage, maximizing their chances to get after the quarterback. A factor why they’re racking up so many sacks.

Williams: 3/4 13 yards, 0 TDs 0 INTs
Bush: 9/13 83 yards, 3 TDs 1 INT
Barron: 10/15 88 yards, 1 TD 1 INT

Defensive Backs

– Target stats from the secondary:

Artie Burns: 2/2 28 yards, 0 TDs 0 INTs
Kam Kelly: 4/4 49 yards, 1 TD 0 INTs
Cam Sutton: 4/11 29 yards, 0 TDs 1 INT
Mike Hilton: 7/12 95 yards, 2 TDs 1 INT
Minkah Fitzpatrick: 7/14 58 yards, 2 TDs 4 INTs
Steven Nelson: 8/15 99 yards, 0 TDs 0 INTs
Terrell Edmunds: 10/15 148 yards, 1 TD 0 INTs
Joe Haden: 16/27 191 yards, 1 TD 1 INT

QB rating of those players when targeted:

Sutton: 7.0
Fitzpatrick: 61.0
Nelson: 74.0
Barron: 76.5
Haden: 77.9
Williams: 78.1
Hilton: 88.5
Bush: 93.9
Burns: 118.8
Edmunds: 121.0
Kelly: 157.3