The Pittsburgh Steelers’ schedule, while not official, looks pretty rough with the leaked version now out in full. The Steelers reportedly don’t play a divisional game until Week 11, meaning six of their final eight games all come against AFC North opponents. It doesn’t sound ideal, but Pro Football Talk’s Mike Florio thinks it’s something that would benefit the Steelers.
Appearing on The PM Team on 93.7 The Fan, Florio explained that given the changes made to Pittsburgh’s roster and at offensive coordinator, not playing their divisional opponents until late could work in its favor.
“I think it’s better that way. You could have banged-up quarterbacks on the opponents, and you have a brand new offense,” he said Wednesday. “It’s going to be fine-tuned, in theory, it’s going to be honed, in theory. Justin Fields or Russell Wilson, whoever the quarterback is, is gonna be operating at a higher level and a greater level of comfort. When you’re the team who’s making the most dramatic change, I think it’s better to get those games later.”
It’s an interesting perspective from Florio, and one that makes a lot of sense. The Steelers could go through some growing pains early on offense. They’ll potentially have two new starting offensive linemen, a new starting quarterback, turnover at wide receiver and a new offense to go along with the new pieces. But by Week 11, two weeks after the reported Week 9 bye, the offense shouldn’t be in flux. The Steelers will be prepared and more comfortable in what they’re doing across the board for when they have to face their intra-division opponents.
Florio thinks it’s beneficial for the Steelers because of the changes, with Arthur Smith coming in at offensive coordinator and obviously Wilson and Fields added to the quarterback room. But for what it’s worth, the rest of the AFC North also had a change at the coordinator positions. Dan Pitcher got promoted to offensive coordinator in Cincinnati, Zach Orr is the new defensive coordinator for the Ravens and the Browns have Ken Dorsey as their new offensive coordinator. The changes in Cincinnati and Baltimore are in-house, but they’re still changes.
So theoretically, all those teams will be comfortable with their new schemes at that point, although the Steelers obviously went through the biggest on-field changes with their quarterback room being revamped.
We won’t know whether it’s good or bad for the Steelers until the games actually happen, but it’s definitely a difficult stretch on paper. Sure, the Steelers might be more comfortable, but you’d think everyone else is too. The Week 11-18 stretch and specifically the divisional games are going to make or break whether the Steelers can make the postseason, so they should hope Florio is right and it does end up benefitting the team playing its rivals with a theoretically higher comfort level.
