The Steelers’ offense has been the new hotness around the league since their last preseason game against the Buffalo Bills. Picking up right where they left off against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in Week One of the preseason, the offense didn’t miss a beat. The starters scored on their first two drives before giving way to the second- and third-team units, which got the score to 27-0 before Buffalo finally got on the board late to make it a 27-15 final score.
Pat McAfee talked about the Steelers’ offense on the Pat McAfee Show Monday, speaking to the progression of the passing game from last season to this season and how much better QB Kenny Pickett looks running OC Matt Canada’s offense.
“Shout out to Kenny Pickett seemingly becoming a dude, I don’t want to say overnight, but the Matt Canada offense is appearing to let him do a lot more stuff,” MacAfee said on the show, which aired live on YouTube. “Them throwing the ball and opening it up with Kenny Pickett has been really fantastic to watch, and people are talking about the Steelers being a sneaky contender this year.”
Pickett talked about working with Canada to take more ownership of the offense in his second season during training camp, working on getting all the checks down and having the ability to change plays at the line of scrimmage. Pickett mentioned that the Steelers didn’t get into all that last year as he was adjusting to the league as a rookie quarterback trying to get the playbook down and learn on the fly after being thrown into the fire Week Four against the New York Jets when starting QB Match Trubisky was benched at halftime.
The growing pains for Pickett and the offense appear to be paying off as they looked impeccable against Buffalo’s first-team defense last Saturday night. It may be the preseason, but the Bills swept the floor with Pittsburgh last season in Buffalo during Pickett’s first career NFL start. That suggests that Pittsburgh has come a ways since last season, at least offensively when they failed to score a touchdown in a 38-3 loss. They will have one more preseason game this Thursday against the Atlanta Falcons to tune things up before heading into the regular season with the San Francisco 49ers defense waiting Week One.
