The Pittsburgh Steelers’ schedule is full of quirks. Three of their first four games are on the road, and they do not face the AFC North until Week 11, playing four straight divisional games over that span. But they’re also going to deal with plenty of short weeks. Three of them, in fact, all come late in the year as an extra twist of the NFL’s knife.
In Week 12, they’ll travel to Cleveland to face the Browns for a Thursday night game. In Week 16, they play a day early, going from a Sunday night game at Philadelphia in Week 15 to going to Baltimore six days later for a Saturday contest. That sets up the Christmas Day game against the Kansas City Chiefs, the team’s first planned Wednesday game since 1936.
Of course, both sides have to deal with the challenge of a short week. But they’re not all created equal. Pittsburgh is the road team for two of those three games, crunching their schedule all the more, and these are moments where coaching really matters. How well can you prepare when you don’t have the time? How organized are you, how do you determine reps, how do you put eight pounds of information into a five pound week? It’s not easy.
With that said, I wanted to see how teams respond to short weeks. Who thrives? Who struggles? Below are the records of teams under their current head coach on a short week, anytime they’re playing under the standard “every seven days” format. Teams who hired a new head coach won’t appear on this list since there’s no data to go off of. The Arizona Cardinals also won’t appear on this list. Though Jonathan Gannon returns as the team’s head coach after being hired in 2023, the Cardinals did not play on a short week last season.
| Team | Short Week Record | Short Week Win % |
|---|---|---|
| Houston Texans | 1-0 | 1.000 |
| Cleveland Browns | 8-1 | .890 |
| Minnesota Vikings | 4-1 | .800 |
| Dallas Cowboys | 9-3 | .750 |
| Jacksonville Jaguars | 3-1 | .750 |
| Kansas City Chiefs | 14-5 | .737 |
| Los Angeles Rams | 12-5 | .706 |
| Green Bay Packers | 9-4 | .692 |
| San Francisco 49ers | 13-6 | .684 |
| Buffalo Bills | 13-6 | .684 |
| Baltimore Ravens | 27-13 | .675 |
| Pittsburgh Steelers | 27-17-1 | .611 |
| Cincinnati Bengals | 7-5 | .583 |
| Philadelphia Eagles | 8-6 | .571 |
| Miami Dolphins | 2-2 | .500 |
| Denver Broncos | 1-1 | .500 |
| Las Vegas Raiders | 1-1 | .500 |
| Chicago Bears | 2-3 | .400 |
| Tampa Bay Buccaneers | 1-3 | .250 |
| New Orleans Saints | 1-5 | .167 |
| Detroit Lions | 1-6 | .143 |
| New York Giants | 1-6 | .143 |
| Indianapolis Colts | 0-1 | .000 |
| New York Jets | 0-6 | .000 |
Putting aside very small sample sizes like the Houston Texans, Kevin Stefanski and his Cleveland Browns top the list. An impressive 8-1 on a short week since he was hired in 2020. For as much flack as he gets, Dallas’ Mike McCarthy does well in these moments with a 9-3 record.
Where do the Steelers land? Twelfth out of 24 qualifying teams, with Mike Tomlin’s tenure the longest on this list. Under him, Pittsburgh is 27-17-1 on a short week, their tie coming against the Detroit Lions in 2021. If you’re wondering, the reason why the Lions don’t have a tie on their list is because they weren’t coming off a short week. They had come off a bye while the Steelers played the Monday night before.
Overall, the Steelers’ record is good, but it’s far from the best. They’ve improved in recent years as the NFL ramped up the number of short weeks with its ever-expanding schedule. In 2023, they went 4-1. In 2022, they went 2-1. In 2021, they finished 1-1-1, and in 2020, the crazy COVID year, they were 3-1. So over the last four seasons, Tomlin’s Steelers are 10-4-1, a .700 win percentage.
It’s worth mentioning how increasingly common short weeks have become as the NFL has carved up its schedule. For most of Tomlin’s early tenure, the Steelers played roughly two short weeks per year. Other teams who weren’t as attractive of a primetime draw saw even less. Now, four or five games per season are common.
Which teams are the worst? It’s worth pointing out that most teams on this list skew to the successful side. Because we didn’t include teams with new head coaches, it excludes bad teams who lost games, which caused them to hire new head coaches. But the Jets’ Robert Saleh is 0-6 on short weeks, while the Detroit Lions’ Dan Campbell is surprisingly poor in these moments. Even setting aside his tough first year inheriting a poor team, he’s just 1-4 on short weeks over the last two years.
It’s worth noting that the Steelers’ short-week opponents have all done about as well, if not better, than Pittsburgh. The Browns, again, take the top spot of teams with a sample size. The Chiefs sit just outside the top five, while the Eagles sport a similar record.
Each year is different, and small sample sizes can make predictive power difficult. But Pittsburgh, on the whole, has done well on a condensed week. That trend will continue, or else the back end of an already tough-looking schedule will be all the more daunting.
