It was a strange year in 2022 for the Pittsburgh Steelers from a pass defense standpoint. Pittsburgh led the league with San Francisco in interceptions (20), yet allowed the second-most touchdown passes in the NFL with 29.
Not only that, the Steelers were one of the worst defenses in the NFL last season when it came to explosive plays allowed.
Some of that can be attributed to playing a long stretch without one of the NFL’s best players in T.J. Watt, but for second-year defensive coordinator Teryl Austin, there’s no excuse for the issues allowing the explosive plays last season, especially through the air.
“I think that’s a big emphasis for us because one of our issues last year, we can blame it on not having T.J., but one of our biggest issues the early part of the year was we give up too many big passes and if you give up big passes, you’re gonna put your defense at risk to give up a lot of points,” Austin said in an interview with the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review’s Tim Benz. “You’re gonna put your offense behind the eight ball. And so we’re gonna make a conscious effort. So those young guys have to know that because that’s been what we’ve been preaching to our veteran guys too, because we can’t allow that. That was awful last year.”
It was just a strange year. Every other metric from the Steelers was good from a pass defense standpoint.
Pittsburgh allowed just a 61.7 completion percentage in 2022, good for sixth-best in the NFL. Pittsburgh also allowed the eighth-fewest completions in the NFL last season with just 332. The Steelers were also middle of the pack in passing yards allowed at 3,779, right there with the Super Bowl-champion Kansas City Chiefs.
However, Pittsburgh had one of the highest yards per attempt in the league at 7.0, tied for fourth-most in football, and allowed one of the highest first-down percentages on completions at 36.2.
If Pittsburgh could have just cut down on the explosive plays it wouldn’t have been as awful as Austin made it out to be in his interview with the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review’s Tim Benz.
But those explosive plays happened, and they happened without Watt on the field.
There was the big Nelson Agholor catch over Ahkello Witherspoon in the Week Three loss to the New England Patriots, and the 32-yard completion in Week Three from Cleveland quarterback Jacoby Brissett to Amari Cooper.
Week Four saw the New York Jets rack up four pass plays of 20-plus yards with Zach Wilson finding Tyler Conklin, Corey Davis, Elijah Moore and Garrett Wilson in a second-half comeback. Week Five was popcorn galore for the Buffalo Bills and Josh Allen against the Steelers, including the 98-yard touchdown to Gabriel Davis and later a 62-yard touchdown.
Things slowed down a little bit after that until the Week Eight matchup against the Eagles when A.J. Brown took over.
That can’t happen moving forward for the Steelers, who have a rebuilt secondary with veterans Patrick Peterson, Chandon Sullivan, Damontae Kazeee and Keanu Neal stepping into key roles, and rookie Joey Porter Jr. pushing for a starting spot.
If Pittsburgh can cut down on the explosive plays allowed, the defense will be all that much better through the air once again and won’t be putting the offense behind the eight ball, at least in Austin’s eyes.
