The Steelers’ schedule has finally been released, and besides letting fans figure out which game they’d like to attend, it’s also given them an idea of how this season will go. Nothing is for certain, and everyone already knew the Steelers would have one of the hardest schedules in the league this year, but their actual schedule is going to do them zero favors. Their last eight games are an absolute gauntlet, including all of their AFC North games and the Chiefs on a short week.
Mike Tomlin has never had a losing season, and it seems like the Steelers always find a way to win, but one analyst believes it’s plausible that the Steelers’ streak of non-losing seasons could end due to this stretch. Dan Orlovsky is a former NFL quarterback and current ESPN analyst, and on the most recent episode of the Dan Patrick Show, he spoke about the horrible back half of the Steelers’ schedule.
“When we were doing the reveal last night [with] Negandhi, Kevin, we went through the schedule, we looked at it a little bit, and then he was like, ‘Wait, guys,’ and we had to bring it back up,” Orlovsky said. “That final seven or eight game stretch is absolutely brutal. You could sit there and go, ‘They could lose all seven,’ just because of how good that schedule stretch is.”
The Steelers’ longest losing streak since Mike Tomlin became the coach was five games in 2009, which did come during the second half of their season, losing from Weeks 10 to 14. It included three losses to AFC North teams, two in overtime, and the Steelers allowing 21 fourth-quarter points to a Raiders team led by journeyman QB Bruce Gradkowski. That season began promising, but any hope of the Steelers repeating as Super Bowl champs quickly died with that string of losses. Although they don’t have strong Super Bowl aspirations like that team, the Steelers could be in a similar situation this year, except worse.
If the Steelers were to lose the last seven games in a row, as Orlovsky says is possible, it would be the team’s worst losing streak since they lost six in a row in 1999. Even worse, the team hasn’t lost more than six consecutive games since Chuck Noll’s first season as the Steelers’ head coach. It would be a throwback to when they were the laughingstock of the league, before the Steel Curtain of the 1970s changed the culture. Would that happen under Tomlin, who has been one of the league’s best in terms of squeezing out wins with underwhelming teams? At the moment, that’s unclear.
For the past few years, everyone has been waiting for the Steelers to finally bottom out and lose more games than they win. Somehow, Tomlin and the Steelers have figured out how to push back against that narrative. Whether they’ve lost their starting quarterback, their best defensive player, or every linebacker and safety they have, the Steelers have found ways to win. This year could be different, but history says otherwise. Just like they always do, the Steelers will find ways to win against teams that are better than them on paper. Losing seven in a row would be unbelievable.
