Filling in for Colin Cowherd on The Herd on FS1, guest host Jason McIntyre ranked every AFC team in tiers. He put the Steelers in the third of four tiers, but said he’s high on them this season.
“I’ll start with the Steelers. You know I’m bullish on them. Can I be driving the Kenny Pickett bandwagon?”
McIntyre has been pretty high on Pittsburgh all offseason, even going as far as to predict an AFC Championship game appearance.
“I really do believe they’re a team to watch,” he continued. “Watt and Highsmith, I like the Steelers.”
Other teams that joined Pittsburgh in Tier Three were the Denver Broncos, Baltimore Ravens, Miami Dolphins, Jacksonville Jaguars, Los Angeles Chargers and Cleveland Browns. Even though it’s the second-lowest tier, there’s a lot of really good teams in there and it speaks to the depth in the AFC this season.
With three AFC North teams in Tier Three, it also speaks to the cluster that the division is going to be. It’s why winning divisional games is going to be so important for the Steelers. Pittsburgh went .500 against divisional opponents last year, but an above .500 record might be necessary to make the playoffs with pretty much every team in the division also improving their roster from 2022.
But if Pickett can take a step up and the offense as a whole improves, the Steelers defense can play with anyone and they could make some noise. Of that list, Miami, Los Angeles and Baltimore all made the playoffs last season, so McIntyre is putting the Steelers in a group where he feels they should be able to compete and make the playoffs.
The only team that feels questionable is the Broncos, but with Sean Payton taking over for Nathaniel Hackett, there’s a lot of hope that Russell Wilson can return to his previous form. If he can’t, Denver won’t be able to hang with the other teams in its tier.
The Steelers should be able to even if Pickett doesn’t take a substantial leap, given the Steelers went 9-8 last season and beat the Ravens and Browns once and should’ve beaten the Dolphins. But being able to compete and keep games close versus being able to win them and make the playoffs is a different story, and that’s what the Steelers should do this season.
Hopefully, the offense takes enough of a step forward for that to become a reality. The talent is there, now they just have to execute when the season kicks off in under two months.
