Home Opener Weekend: Steelers Friday Night Five Questions

Happy Friday and I hope yinz are doing well.

One game down, 16 more to go. The Pittsburgh Steelers got a big Week One win against the Buffalo Bills. They’ll look to go 2-0 Sunday afternoon in their home opener against the Las Vegas Raiders. Heinz Field will be a loud one with a fully capacity crowd for the first time since 2019.

Hope you all have a great weekend and hope you enjoyed following our continued coverage. I thank you for visiting the site and we appreciate all of your great feedback. As always, we have five Friday night questions for you to answer.

Peace and love, peace and love!

1 – Like I said last week, we’ll start each Friday Five with this question. Will the Steelers beat the Raiders this Sunday? 

2 – Najee Harris is still looking for his first NFL touchdown, preseason or regular season. Will he score it this week (either rushing or receiving)?

3 – Cam Heyward needs one more full-sack for the 60th in his career. Will he get it against the Raiders?

4 – Over/under 22 points allowed by the Steelers this weekend?

5 – What will be the result of the Steelers’ first offensive possession? Touchdown, field goal, punt, or turnover?

Tiebreaker: How many offensive snaps will Steelers’ RBs not named Najee Harris record this week? They had zero in Week One. Note this does not include FB Derek Watt. This is only for true RBs (i.e. Benny Snell, Kalen Ballage).

Recap of 2021 Preseason Finale Friday Night 5 Questions

Question 1: The Pittsburgh Steelers defeated the Buffalo Bills 23-16. Just 42.6% of Steelers Depot respondents predicted a Pittsburgh victory. After all, the Steelers were seven-point underdogs.

Question 2: Najee Harris gained just eight yards on seven carries in the first half. He added 37 more yards in the second half to finish with 45 rushing yards well under 65. Respondents liked Najee’s chances in his NFL debut with 80.1% taking the over. Let’s hope that Harris just established the floor of his running production, and it will increase as the offensive line gels this season.

Question 3: Pittsburgh only played 58 offensive snaps against Buffalo. Ben threw the ball just 12 times in the first half but several long drives in the second half drove up his attempts to 32 for the game. Ben has averaged 33.6 passing attempts per game in his regular season career (234 games and 7870 passing attempts). He finished just under 35.5 with 55.9% of respondents taking the over. Many thought the Steelers would have to play catchup which they did since Ben’s touchdown pass to Diontae Johnson resulted in his 47th career game winning drive. That puts Ben in a tie with Dan Marino for fourth place all-time. Only Peyton Manning (54), Drew Brees (53) and Tom freaking Brady (49) have more.

Question 4: TJ Watt told Art Rooney II he was accepting the $112 million extension offer, excused himself to workout, then stepped onto the field. Despite only participating in individual drills during most of training camp, Watt played 69 of 85 defensive snaps. Melvin Ingram wasn’t far behind with 54 snaps. Alex Highsmith who dinged himself in practice played 46. So, the 66.2% of respondents who said Watt would play the most defensive snaps among the trio picked up a point.

Question 5: Ben Roethlisberger targeted eight different receivers during the game. Respondents split 88.2% of their votes among three receivers. Diontae Johnson was the favorite with 39.7% of the total. Chase Claypool placed second with 27.9%. DJ scored a touchdown, and his 36 receiving yards was third among Steeler receivers. Claypool tallied 45 receiving yards to outgain Diontae. But it was JuJu Smith-Schuster who was the also ran with 20.6% of the vote who led Pittsburgh receivers with 52 receiving yards.

Here are the consensus responses of Steelers Depot respondents compared to the correct answers:

We only got one out of five correct as a collective. Come on people, put your thinking caps on. There is moolah at stake here.

Just in case you wondered: some questions from the last preseason game answered Sunday. Karl Joseph did not play. Carlos Buggs played more snaps (17) than Isiah Buggs (8) with neither playing any special teams.

This is the fifth season that I have tracked your Friday Night Five Questions (FN5Q) responses. Over the years, 514 different handles responded to the FN5Q. This week over ten percent of those folks answered the call. Plus, 12 new folks entered the fray. Welcome to you all.

OK Folks the race is on. This week’s questions were deceptively difficult. 17 folks managed to answer three of five questions correctly in a massive tie for third place. But two people managed to sweep the table and pick up the five-point bonus: ManRayX has won the FN5Q two years running. He may be creating a dynasty like the Rooney family with his son GhotiFish now in the mix. Father and son split the $25 weekly prize since we forgot to include the tiebreaker. Come on people! Who is going to wrest the lead from these two? Answer every week for a chance for the weekly prize and an opportunity for the end of season prizes.

2021 Regular Season leaderboard after week 1:

*New to leaderboard

Let me know if you have any questions in the comments or you can always send me a twitter DM @subBurgher or Instagram username quarternelson.