The Pittsburgh Steelers have a lot of talent on offense, on paper. Getting that out on the field each and every week takes a little more doing, and perhaps this team still has a way to go yet before they get any kind of consistently notable productivity from the group.
They didn’t, really, in the opener. They netted only 267 offensive yards despite playing five quarters due to overtime and managed only 16 points, with seven spotted by the defense—and most of their points coming off of turnovers. They’re not there yet, to say the least, but the talent is there, running back Najee Harris thinks.
“We could be really dynamic”, he told Adam Schein on SiriusXM Radio. “We could create a lot of problems for a lot of defenses, because the ball’s gonna get spread around a lot and there’s gonna be a lot of opportunities to be one on one. And we always want one-on-one opportunities. We’ve just got to execute on our part”.
They didn’t, of course, not generally nor situationally. On the matter of the latter, the Steelers converted just four of 15 attempts on third down. They went 1-for-2 in the red zone, which is really neither good nor bad. But their 3.4 yards per carry and 4.9 yards per offensive play leave a lot to be desired.
Many fingers will point immediately to the offensive line, and not unjustifiably. While they held up better in pass protection overall, the run blocking really left a lot to be desired. Harris himself could only muster 26 rushing yards on his 10 attempts. They had their most success using jet sweeps with wide receiver Chase Claypool, who led the team with 36 rushing yards.
“I think that’s what it falls down on is us executing and believing in the gameplan and believing in the coaches and what they call”, Harris said about where the offense has to go next in order to realize the potential the group has.
“I think it’ll create a lot of stress on a lot of defenders, especially with Mitch [Trubisky]. Mitch could use his legs, too. Just us creating all these situations where they can’t stack the box because we got the guys on the edge and they can’t play too deep because we can the ball. So it’s just us executing”.
Trubisky is surrounded by talent at the skill positions, including Harris himself, as well as Pat Freiermuth and Zach Gentry at tight end, and Claypool, Diontae Johnson, and rookie George Pickens at wide receiver.
The offensive line should still improve over the course of the year, even is modestly, but any improvement is necessary at this point for the offense to even get a whiff of what they should be capable of with the assembled talent available.
