For as much as the offense has struggled, the Pittsburgh Steelers needed to do two things. One, hit the reset button, which the bye week allowed. Two, listen to all ideas from all places. It sounds like they’re doing that, too.
Speaking to the media Wednesday, RB Najee Harris said he spent time with C Mason Cole going over film and figuring out what the team could do to presumably improve the run game. They then took that discussion to OC Matt Canada and the Steelers’ coaches, who integrated those ideas into the playbook.
Here’s what Harris said via WTAE’s Emily Giangreco.
“I stayed here an extra day with Mason Cole and looked at some film,” Harris told Giangreco and the Steelers media. “To see what tendencies we need to change. What’s some stuff we need to change as an offense.”
The easy answer is that the Steelers need to change everything. Including the coordinator. But that obviously isn’t happening midseason. The Steelers must play the hand they’re dealt and make tweaks to the offense, a comment from Harris that Cole mentioned on Monday. That means throwing out the plays that have not worked, like this inside zone/jet run that hasn’t been successful on any of its attempts this season, and getting back to basics and the calls that do work.
Harris is confident his message has been heard by the coaching staff.
“It’s going to be in this game plan…the stuff that we talked about, me and Mason, is happening now,” he said. “It’s a lot better looks into stuff.”
One issue for Pittsburgh’s stunted run game has been poor pre-snap looks. Running into box counts where the defense has one more player than the Steelers have blockers. Or fronts where the blocking scheme won’t be as effective as it should be, putting players in difficult matchups. As we showed in today’s video, their Zorro Toss was asking a wide receiver to crack a linebacker, a tough matchup to win and sustain.
Of course, execution still plays an obvious factor in the running game and offense succeeding. The greatest game plan in the world doesn’t matter if the players don’t do their job. But bye weeks are the time to focus on big picture and scheme, and it seems like that was time well spent by Harris, Cole, and company.
