Steelers 4 Downs: Blitzburgh is back, no reason for tight ends to celebrate

1. Dialing it up

The Pittsburgh Steelers have a reputation for bringing the blitz. After a two-year hiatus, they are back at it in 2023.

According to pro-football-reference.com, only four NFL teams blitz at a higher rate this season than the Steelers’ 37.9%. That number is a significant increase over the Steelers’ blitz rates last season and in 2021, when they blitzed 31.5% and 27% of the time, respectively. Two years ago, the Steelers fell all the way to 13th in the league in regards to how often they blitz.

But from 2018-20 — the first three seasons for which Pro Football Reference collected data — the Steelers finished among the top seven blitzing teams each year.

Incidentally, the Steelers rank fourth in the NFL in Pro Football Focus’ subjective grading for pass rush. Their ability to get to the quarterback could play a critical role in Sunday’s game against the Jacksonville Jaguars. When the Jaguars’ Trevor Lawrence has been pressured this season, he has completed just 48.1% of his passes with a 75.2 passer rating. When he’s “kept clean,” those numbers improve dramatically to 72.7% completion rate and 97.7 rating.

2. No means to (tight) ends

Last Sunday was promoted as National Tight Ends Day, a tongue-in-cheek “holiday” promoted by the NFL in recent years on the fourth Sunday of October.

Forgive yourself if, as a Steelers fan, you didn’t notice it.

Last week’s Steelers-Rams game featured a combined total of 35 receiving yards by tight ends. That’s for all tight ends on both teams.

That wasn’t unusual for the Steelers this season. They by far have had games that feature the sparsest production from tight ends.

In six games this season, the entirety of the Steelers’ tight ends corps (Pat Freiermuth, Connor Heyward, Darnell Washington, Rodney Williams) has combined for 16 catches for 128 yards.

Teams the Steelers have been facing, though, barely top that meager production. The Steelers rank second in the NFL in fewest catches (19) and fewest receiving yards (188) allowed to opposing tight ends this season.

3. Stack the box

At least by one commonly cited (yet less-commonly quantified) measure, the Steelers last week did not prioritize one of their most prized tenets of defense against the Rams.

While stopping the run is a mantra oft-repeated in Pittsburgh, last week for only 10% of carries by Los Angeles running backs did Steelers defensive coaches deploy an “eight-man box.” According to Next Gen Stats, during three of Darrell Henderson’s 18 carries did he encounter eight or more defenders near the line of scrimmage, and during none of Royce Freeman’s carries did he see that defense.

While the fact that these two were, in effect, the Rams’ fourth- and fifth-stringers at running back surely had something to do with it, the Steelers stacking the box so infrequently was a stark departure from what they had done most of their first five games of the season.

The lowest “eight-men-in-the-box” rate any qualifying opposing running back had faced against the Steelers before last week was 25% (by the Baltimore Ravens’ Gus Edwards). The Steelers had a stacked-box percentage of 54.2% against the Houston Texans’ Dameon Pierce, 53.3% against the Las Vegas Raiders’ Josh Jacobs, 26.9% against the Cleveland Browns duo of Nick Chubb and Jerome Ford and a whopping 68.2% rate against the San Francisco 49ers’ Christian McCaffrey in Week 1. That led the NFL for a running back in Week 1, and Pearce’s eight-man-box rate was second highest of any back in Week 4.

4. Not many bodies

Trivial but true: Only three NFL teams this season have used fewer players during the regular season than the Steelers, who have deployed 56 players through six games. The Steelers have used 25 players on offense, 26 on defense and 50 on special teams.

Only five teams have used fewer unique lineups on offense. The Steelers have lined up 96 combinations off 11 players for an offensive snap this season, a figure that might sound like a lot until it’s known that the New Orleans Saints have used a league-high 244 in seven games.

When it comes to starting lineups, the Steelers have used five starting 11s each on offense and defense through the first six weeks of the 2023 season.

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