Steelers look to continue tormenting Saints QB Andy Dalton

To paraphrase the closing line from the movie “The Silence of the Lambs”, the Pittsburgh Steelers are having an old friend for lunch Sunday.

It’s not hyperbole to suggest that when the Steelers get together with Andy Dalton, they feast on him the way Hannibal Lecter does his dining companions.

Consider that Dalton, a 12-year NFL veteran enjoying a bounce-back season with the New Orleans Saints, has a 76-60-2 career record against the 31 other NFL teams. When employed by the Cincinnati Bengals, that record was 67-48-2.

But when the Red Rifle starts against the Steelers, he suddenly turns into a BB gun. His record in 16 career starts is 3-13.

Dalton hasn’t beaten the Steelers since 2015, when he led the Bengals to an AFC North title. He takes a personal seven-game losing streak into the matchup Sunday when the Steelers play the Saints at Acrisure Stadium.

Still, defensive captain Cameron Heyward, like Dalton a member of the 2011 draft class, isn’t taking the Steelers’ longtime punching bag lightly.

“Everybody likes to give Andy a hard time, but I think he has been one of the more productive quarterbacks in our league,” Heyward said. “You don’t just have a 12-year career being a slouch. He’s been doing something right.”

Just not against the Steelers.

Not only can’t Dalton beat the Steelers when he is on the field, his teams can’t get the job done for him when he is on the sideline. Counting the wild-card playoff loss after the 2015 season when Dalton didn’t play, his teams have lost 12 consecutive games against the Steelers.

That includes a defeat last season when Dalton was the backup with the Chicago Bears and another in 2020 when he was on the reserve/covid-19 list with the Dallas Cowboys.

Since it has been more than three seasons since Dalton last played against the Steelers, coach Mike Tomlin suggested a “cat-and-mouse” game might take place when the two sides renew acquaintances.

No matter that Dalton typically has served as the mouse in such scenarios.

“He’s always been a good and prudent decision maker,” Tomlin said. “He makes fluid decisions. He gets rid of the ball rather quickly. He utilizes all his eligibles, and they’ve got a nice collection of eligibles.”

Dalton actually has played better against the Steelers than his record suggests. In those 16 starts, he has thrown 19 touchdown passes against 14 interceptions, and he never has thrown more than two interceptions in a game. But the Steelers made life miserable for him by sacking him 37 times — or 2.3 per game.

“You have a long list of what we’ve done in the past when we’ve played him when he was in Cincinnati,” outside linebacker T.J. Watt said. “It’s a different offensive scheme he’s playing in now, and he’s a capable guy. He can get the ball out quick and make some quick reads.”

Dalton will try to turn around his fortunes Sunday with his fourth team in as many seasons. After spending one year in Chicago, where he yo-yoed between starting and backing up Justin Fields, Dalton signed a one-year deal with the Saints, presumably to back up Jameis Winston.

Dalton replaced an injured Winston in the fourth week of the season and has led an offensive resurgence for the Saints even if their 3-6 record doesn’t reflect it.

Since Dalton entered the lineup, the Saints are sixth in the NFL in net yards per game and seventh in points, averaging nearly 27 per game. Dalton also has completed 65.3% of his passes for 1,385 yards, 10 touchdowns and five interceptions. He ranks eighth in the NFL in touchdown percentage, 10th in fourth-quarter passer rating and ninth with a 93.4 passer rating that is six points higher than his career average.

“Being around veteran quarterbacks when meetings happen and how he talks in meetings and what he says to receivers on the field, you can tell he’s been around a long time, and he knows a lot about the game,” said guard James Daniels, who was Dalton’s teammate in Chicago last season. “He knows a lot of football. It’s good that he’s doing so well.”

Dalton hasn’t started regularly since the Bengals replaced him with No. 1 overall pick Joe Burrow in 2020. When Dalton played with Daniels in Chicago, Dalton began the season as the starter before being injured in the second game. He started two more games at midseason and made the final two starts of the regular season.

“He was good, but there were so many other things going on that it was very tough for him to come in and succeed,” Daniels said. “Last year he had to come back later in the season. This year is vice versa. He’s done a good job of managing that.”

By no means is Dalton a long-term solution for the Saints in the post-Drew Brees era. Calls for Winston to regain his starting job surfaced when Dalton struggled in a 27-13 loss Monday night against Baltimore. He didn’t get the Saints into the end zone until 4 minutes, 13 seconds remained in the game.

Saints coach Dennis Allen, though, said he never was tempted to bench Dalton during the game.

“I think over the last five weeks, he has been pretty good in moving the football effectively,” Allen said after the game. “This wasn’t a good game. … We’ll evaluate as we move forward, but I’m looking at this as a bad day at the office offensively.”

Another one against the Steelers wouldn’t be surprising given Dalton’s track record.