The Pittsburgh Steelers’ lopsided time of possession wasn’t just bad within the scope of their Sunday game against the Philadelphia Eagles, it was borderline historic for the franchise.
The Steelers’ offensive identity entering the season was clear. They wanted to control the clock with a combination of their own rushing attack and an excellent defense. They’ve done a nice job with that identity this season but suffered a huge setback against the Eagles in Week 15.
After winning (or tying) the time of possession (TOP) battle in all but two games this season, the Steelers suffered a lopsided defeat in this category. The Steelers possessed the ball for just 20:08. Their worst this season was 27:31 against the Dallas Cowboys, for comparison. The Steelers entered Week 15 with the best average TOP in the league at 32:29 per game. It will be interesting to see how far they fall down the list after their 27-13 loss in Philadelphia.
According to Sports Reference, this is the sixth-worst TOP performance in Steelers history since the stat started being tracked in 1983. They haven’t had a performance this poor since 2003, when they only possessed the ball for 20:00.
| Date | TOP | Week | Opp | Result |
| 1983-12-04 | 17:52 | 14 | Bengals | L 10-23 |
| 1989-09-10 | 19:10 | 1 | Browns | L 0-51 |
| 1983-10-10 | 19:46 | 6 | Bengals | W 24-14 |
| 2003-10-26 | 20:00 | 8 | Rams | L 21-33 |
| 1991-10-20 | 20:05 | 8 | Seahawks | L 7-27 |
| 2024-12-15 | 20:08 | 15 | Eagles | L 27-13 |
| 1990-09-30 | 20:14 | 4 | Dolphins | L 6-28 |
The worst TOP performance in team history at just 17:52 came in 1983 against the Cincinnati Bengals. Strangely enough, both of the Steelers’ games against the Bengals that season are on this dubious list, but they actually won one of them, 24-14, with just 19:46 TOP.
When the Steelers are under 22:00 in TOP, they have a 3-13 record since 1983. One of their worst performances came in a 51-0 loss to the Cleveland Browns — yuck!
How did things get so bad against the Eagles? There are a number of stats you can point to.
For one, they allowed the Eagles to go 11-of-18 (61.1 percent) on third and fourth down. The defense couldn’t get off the field. The Eagles possessed the ball for 24:10 in the second half. They out-possessed the Steelers’ entire game in just the second half. I’ve never seen a drive breakdown quite like this in the second half, per ESPN’s play-by-play.
That’s it. That’s the entire second half. Just five drives, and just 11 plays for the Steelers compared to a whopping 47 for the Eagles.
One of the reasons the defense performed so poorly in those situations was the offense failing to hold up its end of the bargain. The Steelers were 3-of-10 (30 percent) on third down. The Eagles ran 77 total plays to the Steelers’ 41.
The one chance the Steelers had to even up time of possession was winning the turnover battle. They got off to a promising start with two forced fumbles early on, but Najee Harris fumbled away a toss play to give up their one advantage in this game.
How concerning is it for a team that prides itself on possessing the ball and avoiding self-inflicted wounds to have a game like this in mid-December just before the playoffs? That story is still to be written. The aforementioned 1983 Steelers were one and done in the playoffs.
