Stop me if you’ve heard this one before: an NFL executive is confident that Pittsburgh Steelers offensive coordinator Matt Canada is primed for a breakout year.
Yeah, I had no fear of needing to stop.
But apparently there is someone out there, supposedly a general manager for a team in the NFC, who feels that way, even if much of it is rooted in the development of the team around him, from the growth of second-year QB Kenny Pickett to the personnel the front office has added around him, courtesy of general manager Omar Khan.
“He knows how to build a team and put that quarterback in position to succeed”, Jason La Canfora quotes the anonymous executive as telling him in a recently published article about the team for the Washington Post in which the Steelers were, for the umpteenth time, declared a sleeper team.
While Khan supplied the ingredients, including veteran free agent G Isaac Seumalo, WR Allen Robinson II, and rookies Broderick Jones and Darnell Washington, it is Canada who will do the cooking, with Pickett as his sous chef.
“This year, I think [Canada] has a real coming-out party with the quarterback”, that lovable rascal of an anonymous general manager is quoted as having said in the article referred to above. “I could see it coming last year. This offense is going to be a problem”.
The offense was a problem last year, only it was the Steelers’ problem. They ranked 26th in the NFL in averaging just 18.1 points per game. They scored 19 points or fewer in four of their final six games despite winning five of them.
It helped that the defense held opponents to 17 points or fewer over the final seven games, of which they won six. The only loss in that span was to the Baltimore Ravens, a game in which Pickett was injured and his backup, Mitch Trubisky, threw three interceptions.
There is something to be said, regarding the low scoring, for the fact that the Steelers’ games also featured fewer drives on average, and thus fewer opportunities to score. Their 89 drives in their final nine games were tied for the second fewest in the NFL behind only the Atlanta Falcons, the Houston Texans having as many as 110 drives. Their 42.7 percent of drives producing points was the eighth best in the NFL in the second half of the season, though their touchdown rate was in the middle of the pack. They had the highest rate of drives ending in field goals.
The key this year will be turning those field goals into touchdowns, and they looked like they could do it in the preseason. But even if they do manage that, one has to wonder how many would credit Canada for it. I suspect most, particularly Steelers fans, would argue that they are succeeding in spite of him.
