Winners and losers from the Pittsburgh Steelers’ crazy 44-38 win against the Cincinnati Bengals Sunday afternoon.
WINNERS
QB Russell Wilson
As obvious as they come. Wilson was excellent today. Bouncing back from a first drive pick-six, Wilson carved up the Bengals’ defense the rest of the way. He threw three touchdowns passes, led a solid end-of-half drive to get three more points (despite some questionable Mike Tomlin clock management), and showed accuracy and made big plays at all levels. Easily the best performance by a Steelers quarterback in a long time. He finished with 414 yards and three touchdowns. Can’t say enough good things about his outing.
DL Cam Heyward
Heyward remains one of the best interior linemen in football. He’s shown that all year but brought it again against the Bengals, a team he has always had success against. He bullied and collapsed the pocket to pick up a sack and tipped a Joe Burrow fourth-quarter pass that CB Donte Jackson picked off. He also had a goal line lick early in the half.
Despite his age, the 35-year-old Heyward remains in the prime of his career. There weren’t a ton of defensive plays made today but Heyward came up with big ones.
EDGE T.J. Watt
Watt came up with one of the other big defensive moments. A sack/forced fumble against Joe Burrow late in the first half that helped momentarily keep the scoring down. Preston Smith recovered. It gave him 8.5 sacks and a league-best five forced fumbles, quieting concerns after a poor outing against the Cleveland Browns.
Watt added a half-sack on Burrow later, a key third-down stop that forced Cincinnati to settle for a field goal. A reminder that No. 90 remains atop the DPOY conversation.
EDGE Nick Herbig
And it was Nick Herbig’s sack/forced fumble that helped run up the scoreboard. A big-time takeaway that LB Payton Wilson scooped and scored to make it 41-24 in the fourth quarter. Herbig cleanly beat highly paid Bengals LT Orlando Brown Jr. around the edge to knock the ball away. He continues to make high-level impact plays virtually every chance he gets.
Najee Harris/Running Backs Receiving
The Bengals, like defenses are beginning to do, played a lot of loose and two-high coverage to take away Russell Wilson’s moon ball. That softened things up underneath and allowed the running backs to do damage there. Najee Harris, Jaylen Warren, and Cordarrelle Patterson all took advantage and got YAC.
Harris finished the day with well over 100 total yards of offense in a well-rounded showing despite missing a bit of time in the first half.
TE Pat Freiermuth
Freiermuth comes alive against the Bengals. His last two 60-plus yard performances have come against Cincinnati, his 120-yard showing in the first game post-Matt Canada last year and today’s outing. Wilson found Freiermuth on an extended play in the second half to put him over the 60-yard mark. Like the running backs, he helped out underneath.
TE Darnell Washington/WR Ben Skowronek
These two might not be as obvious as the others above but they did plenty of the dirty work. Both had key blocks on Harris’ touchdown run, a walk-in because of the lane created by Washington (and Dan Moore Jr. and Zach Frazier). Skowronek had an end-zone pancake on that play, one snap after Mike Hilton was flagged for a post-snap penalty. Skowronek even got involved offensively, catching a 23-yard pass down the seam.
Excited to watch the All-22 of both players and their hidden contributions.
LOSERS
CB Joey Porter Jr.
When it rains, it pours. Porter’s flags come in bunches, and he might’ve set a record for most penalties against one defensive back today. It’s hard to even keep track of how many. About six of them were thrown with at least one declined. He was called for holding and DPI on the same play, helping set up a Bengals fourth-quarter touchdown to make things 41-31. He even let a sure interception through his hands near the end of the game that would’ve iced things. Cincinnati scored on the next play.
Porter can go stretches without penalty. But today was rough. An early view suggests the Steelers had Porter on WR Tee Higgins, not Ja’Marr Chase, something that was reported to occur pregame. Perhaps they tried to take a page out of the Belichick playbook of putting their best corner on the opposition’s No. 2 while doubling the No. 1.
Scheme aside, one of the worst games you’ll see from a corner.
LB Patrick Queen
Tough one for Queen today in all facets. His run defense looked shaky, helping allow Bengals RB Chase Brown to bust off big first-half runs. He’s not the only one but struggled to stay in position and slow Brown down before his elite speed could get going.
Queen also struggled in coverage, giving up a pass over the middle to TE Mike Gesicki while also having trouble tackling underneath. He’s put in better Steelers performances recently, but this wasn’t one of them.
WR George Pickens
Normally, a box score like his gets you on the winners’ list and far away from the losers’ section. Pickens made some plays, including the Steelers’ first touchdown on a high-scoring day. But there was too much of Pickens’ problems that overshadowed his plays. A taunt that cost the team 15 yards. An unsportsmanlike conduct penalty minimized a beautiful moon ball that would’ve set up the Steelers at the Bengals’ 13. The drive went backwards and ended in Chris Boswell having his kick blocked.
I’ve given Pickens more grace than most for some of the off-field actions/comments than most. But there’s no excuses today. Dumb, costly stuff that hurt his team and washed out the positive plays he did make.
