When the Pittsburgh Steelers and Los Angeles Chargers face off tomorrow afternoon at Acrisure Stadium, it will be a matchup of identical styles. Both teams are determined to run the football and play shutdown defense, which makes tomorrow’s game so interesting.
With the two teams’ strengths being the exact same, it could be tempting to try and switch up the style and attack the Chargers via the passing attack, but Steelers head coach Mike Tomlin will not be doing that. Instead, he is excited to be going up against an opponent similar to the Steelers and wants to impose Pittsburgh’s style.
“Styles make fights, and there’s gonna be an intensity to this game, and really probably the team that breaks personality first is the team that’s probably at a disadvantage,” said Tomlin on The Mike Tomlin Show in a clip posted to YouTube. “We gotta be the Steelers. We expect them to be the Chargers, but styles make fights, as they say in the boxing world, and this will be an awesome fight.”
Although we are only two games into the season, the statistical similarities between Pittsburgh and Los Angeles are absurd. The Chargers and Steelers are one and two in opponents points per game, with Los Angeles allowing only 6.5 points per game and the Steelers only eight. Additionally, the Steelers and Chargers are top-five in rushing attempts, with the Steelers at one with 38.5 runs per game and the Chargers at five with 35.5.
Given QB Just Herbert’s ankle injury, Los Angeles could run the ball even more than usual tomorrow. Although Chargers head coach Jim Harbaugh said that Herbert is doing everything he can to play, even if he does, his movement will likely be limited. In pictures that have surfaced of Chargers’ practices, Herbert’s ankle is heavily taped up. It would make sense that if he plays, the Chargers would limit the possibility of Herbert having to run away from pass rushers T.J. Watt and Alex Highsmith and instead run the ball a lot with J.K. Dobbins and Gus Edwards.
The Steelers and Chargers are so stylistically similar that Tomlin said whoever breaks from their personality is likely to be at a disadvantage. Tomlin and Harbaugh have constructed their teams the way they have because they feel that it is the way their teams can be the most successful. It is hard to argue with them, too, given that both teams are off to 2-0 starts.
Sunday afternoon may feel like we hopped into a time machine back to the 1990s. While not everyone likes that kind of football, Tomlin and Harbaugh revel in it, which will make tomorrow an awesome heavyweight bout by two teams trying to prove they are legitimate threats in the AFC.
