How could yesterday’s game gone differently at the 15:00 mark in the first quarter? On the very first offensive play of the game, Pittsburgh Steelers WR Diontae Johnson had a chance to make a big play down the middle of the field. He didn’t. it would be another 20 minutes before the Steelers would get a first down.
“It was on the tip of my fingers”, he said after the game about his failure to make that catch to open out the afternoon, via the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. “Right here. It’s just one of them situations where I just got to keep running and just make the catch. There’s no excuses”.
Right from the word go, QB Kenny Pickett launched a deep shot right in between the hashes about 27 yards down the field. But on a wet and slippery day at Acrisure Stadium, Johnson could not corral it with an over-the-shoulder grab. Was it worried about the two defenders converging on his position?
I don’t think so. The ball just slipped out of his grip. Blame it on the conditions if you want—I suspect few Steelers fans are in a particularly charitable mood right now—but Johnson isn’t making excuses for his failure to make the play, and neither am I.
He makes that play and the Steelers are already operating in Jaguars territory. They would not run a play beyond midfield until seven minutes into the second quarter, on their fifth possession, after failing to convert on that opening play.
The very next snap, the offensive line allowed Pickett to get sacked, and a penalty on third down would have negated another catch opportunity on a scramble drill that Johnson failed to secure. That was just the first of four consecutive three-and-out drives the team had to open the game.
I don’t know about you, but it’s hard not to wonder how the game might have unfolded if Johnson makes that play. I know there were still 59-plus minutes left to play, but given how things unfolded, perhaps that was the spark they needed that they didn’t have throughout the afternoon.
This is a big-play offense when it’s actually working quite simply because that is what the Steelers need to be in order to function. For whatever reason, this unit lacks the play-to-play consistency to sustain the sort of long drives that populated the second half of the 2022 season.
Johnson, by the way, still finished the game with eight receptions (albeit on 14 targets) for 85 yards, both team highs. He had a good shot at his first touchdown since 2021 later in the game if only Pickett had gotten the ball out sooner—I would argue that the fact he slipped reaching for the pass that was behind him was irrelevant to the outcome of the play.
But there is plenty of blame to go around for yesterday’s failings, and on the first play of the game, that blame belongs to Johnson. No excuses. The throw was there. He was open. The weather conditions were troublesome, but he makes enough money to be expected to make those plays. This time, he didn’t.
