Training camp is still several weeks away, but that isn’t stopping astute football analysts from capitalizing on the mid-July sports lull. There’s no better way to do this than dropping a Super Bowl contenders list, weeding out the bottom 10 or 20 teams to highlight the top 10 or 15 teams that could hoist the Lombardi trophy in February.
Conor Orr, a senior NFL writer for Sports Illustrated, ranked the 12 teams that can win the Super Bowl next season, and the Pittsburgh Steelers didn’t make the cut.
His list included the Chiefs, Bills, Jets, Ravens, Bengals, Browns, Texans, 49ers, Rams, Lions, Packers, and Eagles. If you’re paying attention, he placed the entire AFC North in the contender tier, except for the Steelers.
I’m not a delusional fan. I understand that the Steelers haven’t really cracked into “contender status” since the first half of the 2020 season, before the team imploded with four of five losses to close the regular season followed by an embarrassing home playoff loss to the Browns. The last time the Steelers would have been considered true preseason Super Bowl contenders was probably heading into the 2018 season — the final ride of the “Killer Bs:” Ben Roethlisberger, Antonio Brown, and Le’Veon Bell — when they were +1000 to win the Super Bowl only behind the Patriots. The Steelers are listed around +5000 to win the Super Bowl this year.
The Steelers have lots of question marks heading into the 2024 season, more than many teams in contender status. The Ravens and Bengals absolutely belong in this grouping. They’ve both been knocking on the door in recent years, with the Bengals a few plays away from winning the Super Bowl in 2022, and the Ravens falling short in the AFC Championship Game last season, after finishing with the NFL’s best regular-season record. And both squads have answers to the biggest question of all: Do we have a quarterback who can take us there? Joe Burrow and Lamar Jackson can lead a team to the Super Bowl, even with Jackson’s poor playoff track record.
The Browns achieving contender status over the Steelers is much more debatable. Cleveland had a remarkable run last season, winning 11 games and reaching the playoffs despite significant injury woes, simultaneously winning over the NFL world as a 38-year-old Joe Flacco went on a “Linsanity” run in the second half of the season. Yet they were trounced more soundly than the Steelers were in the first round of the playoffs, losing by 30 points to a rookie quarterback. Deshaun Watson is back, but he’s now put up 12 uninspiring games over the past two years since his suspension. He hasn’t shown any signs that would indicate he’s able to lead a team to a Super Bowl, and he’s certainly done less than a “washed up” Russell Wilson did in Denver.
The Steelers are perceived as a middle-of-the-pack team heading into this season. They’re a fun story that will get lots of media attention as Russell Wilson vs. Justin Fields debates carry into the season and Mike Tomlin’s winning-record streak gains some headlines. But they aren’t respected as real Super Bowl contenders in most people’s eyes. They haven’t inspired lots of hope in recent years, as they haven’t won a playoff game since 2016.
It’s time for the Steelers to play with an edge, use the fact that they have the worst odds to win the AFC North as motivation to prove doubters wrong. After all, it’s the Pittsburgh Steelers, and last I checked they still have six more Lombardi trophies than the Browns and Bengals combined.
