The Pittsburgh Steelers generated five yards per carry on their way to running for 126 yards in their second preseason game against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, and offensive coordinator Arthur Smith is happy with the progress the ground game is making. Speaking to the media on Monday, Smith told reporters that he thought the run game was a positive on Saturday.
“I thought it got going. That was good to see,” Smith said via Brian Batko of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette on Twitter.
“I thought it got going and that was good to see. We hit some 10 plus yard runs. We had a couple of nine-yard runs. You just want to see improvement and progress in it. Like I said, we don’t try to trick anybody in the preseason or show your hand too much. Things we may want to use in week one or week two, but just the basic stuff, there was improvement there from week one to week two that was encouraging,” Smith said via transcript provided by the team.
Rookie RB Kaleb Johnson ran the ball 11 times for 50 yards, a nice bounce back from a so-so first performance, and Smith said the strides he’s made were evident against the Buccaneers.
“You just want to see that progress, and certainly [Saturday] was good for him. It was good to see him get going and that’s why we left him in there,” Smith added via Batko.
Getting the run game going will be a key for Pittsburgh’s offensive success this season. The run game has long been a tenet of Smith’s offenses, and Johnson in particular is a good fit for his zone-run scheme, as it’s similar to what he played in at Iowa. It was also a good sign that Pittsburgh’s run game had a decent performance without RB Jaylen Warren, as he got the night off with the Steelers resting multiple starters.
Johnson is going to play a big role along with Warren in the backfield, and there was some trepidation about how much he could contribute after running eight times for 20 yards in the Steelers’ preseason opener. While it wasn’t a perfect performance on Saturday, Johnson at least showed some of the flashes that made him a third-round pick, including a nice 14-yard run in the first quarter.
Johnson knows there’s still room to improve, but the more reps he gets, the more comfortable he’ll be heading into the regular season. With him having some success on the ground, the Steelers kept him in the game into the second half and he was able to build on some of his momentum and put together a solid performance.
The run game was one of the biggest disappointments throughout training camp, so the signs of life it showed on Saturday were at least promising. Hopefully for the Steelers, it wasn’t a one-off performance, and the run game can be a strength for the team when the regular season gets underway.
