Style points might not matter in the NFL, but that doesn’t mean that the way in which you win games is irrelevant. If you’re winning games that you should be losing, then the odds suggest you will in time begin losing them as the basic principles of probability even out.
Many are wondering right now if the Pittsburgh Steelers’ luck ran out yesterday afternoon against a Cleveland Browns team starting rookie reserve fifth-round QB Dorian Thompson-Robinson. The offense mustered just 10 points in a game in which the defense held the Browns to 13 but gave up the game-winning drive in the final minutes.
The Steelers lucked their way through the first half of the season to a 6-3 record, winning every one of their close games. They were losing at some point in each of the six games that they won, with three game-winning drives in the fourth quarter. But so much has to go right, so often, in other to win that way. It’s obvious to those in the locker room.
“You could look at the record and say, ‘Okay, we’re still good right now’”, RB Najee Harris said yesterday, via 93.7 The Fan. “Or you could look at the record and be like, ‘If we keep playing this type of football, how long is that s— gonna last? I look at it like, ‘How long is this s— gonna last?’”.
It’s a well-worn subject this season about sustaining the unsustainable. They continue to be among the very few teams able to win with reasonable consistency while being outgained every single week. But there’s a reason why teams that are outperformed tend to have losing records. Generally, they’re not very good, and the wins and losses have a tendency to even themselves out.
“Y’all could look at it like it’s a good record, but I mean, it’s the NFL. Winning like how we did is not gonna get us nowhere”, Harris said. He also admitted that there are times that it seems the defense knows what it’s doing. “I’m just at a point where I’m just tired of this of this s—“.
Now 6-4, the Steelers are still in position to make the playoffs—there are only seven teams with fewer than five losses—but the road is narrowing. They have four teams currently within a game of them, namely the Buffalo Bills, the Indianapolis Colts, the Denver Broncos, and the Cincinnati Bengals. They will be playing the Colts and Bengals yet, the latter twice.
The Steelers are 5-0 this season when they score 20 or more points and 1-4 when they don’t. They are also 1-3 when the defense allowed 20 or more points, with the one win coming in a game in which defensive touchdowns provided the margin for victory. Yesterday’s 13-10 loss makes them 5-1 when the defense allows fewer than 20 points.
At some point, the magic runs out, like it did yesterday. The offense did absolutely nothing on its final three possessions after stalling in the red zone with the chance to take a lead. The Steelers’ scoring chances are rare enough but failing to capitalize on the ones they do earn—that’s not sustainable.
