Four Things to Watch for in Steelers Home Opener vs. Patriots
The Pittsburgh Steelers will take on the New England Patriots in Week 2 with plenty of change coming - hopefully. The team's objectives seem to be to build on the offense and continue to dominate on the defensive side of the ball.
Here's what to watch for.
Run Mitch, Run
It's no secret that Trubisky's mobility played a big role in why the Steelers decided to court him in free agency, now it's time to put those wheels to the test.
The Patriots defense was top five in man coverage usage last season and despite losing J.C. Jackson to the Los Angeles Chargers in the offseason, they were fairly comfortable manning up on the outside last week against the likes of Tyreek Hill and Jaylen Waddle. While the Patriots may feel confident in their cornerback group, man coverage always has weaknesses that the offense can exploit.
One of those is that the defenders turn their back to the quarterback, meaning less eyes will be on Trubisky in the pocket.
Look for Mitch to have opportunities to pull the back down and run for a couple of first downs today. Trubisky has only faced Bill Belichick's defense once in his career, back in October of 2018. That day he ran for 81 yards and a touchdown while almost pulling off the upset. In that matchup, the Patriots played man coverage on 32 snaps according to Sports Info Solutions and it's reasonable to expect that to continue today.
Trubisky's athleticism on the move is arguably his most redeeming trait as a signal caller and today would be a good day to utilize that to its fullest potential.
Playmakers Will Have Their Chances on the Boundary
As mentioned above, the New England secondary isn't scared to line up and trust their corners to hold up in man coverage. Even more notable is that they're primarily a MOFC (middle of the field closed) team meaning that they like to keep a post safety, usually Devin McCourty, as a centerfielder at almost all times. They deployed a single high safety last week 78% of the time, which ranked first in usage around the NFL. What this means is that they're willing to play their corners on the outside without much help over the top.
Enter George Pickens.
These are the matchups that the Steelers dreamed about when selected him in the second round of the 2022 NFL Draft out of Georgia. Pickens ran a ton of vertical routes last week against the Cincinnati Bengals, including one where he seemingly beat his man only for Trubisky to overthrow him out of bounds. They pushed the ball down the field in this manner last week but with little success. Giving Diontae Johnson a couple of opportunities down the field would also behoove the Steelers offense as he showed last week that he's more than capable of winning at the catch point.
A couple of explosive plays could very well change the outcome of the week and the matchup is there for the taking.
New England's Dynamic Ground Duo
While the Patriots don't have a superstar RB1 that they identify as a feature back necessarily, they do boast a talented duo with Damien Harris and Rhamondre Stevenson.
With a new play caller in Matt Patricia, there's plenty of mystery around what exactly this Patriots offense is intending to look like but it seems logical that the unit will go as the run game goes. Between Harris and Stevenson in 2021, they combined to rush for over 1,500 yards and 20 touchdowns, leading the Patriots offense to a top ten rushing rank around the league.
It all starts up front with New England's quality offensive line and arguably their most dangerous weapon in the trenches of former sixth-round pick, Michael Onwenu. His talent jumps off the film, displaying heavy hands and explosive power in the run game.
New England did seem to utilize more zone blocking concepts last week than what I expected and had some success doing so, running mostly inside zone.
The good news for the Steelers is that they're coming off a dominant performance against Joe Mixon and company last week, showing that their woes stopping the run last year might just be a thing of the past.
The Return of Blitzburgh?
One of the more interesting revelations of last season was Pittsburgh's reduced blitz percentage.
They did still lead the NFL in sacks after all. They just opted to let their front four work on it's own while electing to give more help on the back end.
Things are different now without the 2021 Defensive Player of the Year, T.J. Watt, who's likely shut down until closer to the bye week. In the two games that Watt missed last season, Tomlin's defense blitzed a little bit more to compensate for the loss of Watt, something that should be noted heading into this week.
We saw some new and interesting fronts from the Steelers defense last week against the Bengals, which was potentially an ode to new assistant coach Brian Flores. Flores obviously is very familiar with the Patriots and how they do things, having spent the vast majority of his career as an assistant in Foxborough prior to facing off against them twice a year as the head coach of the Dolphins.
New England had some communication issues up front last week on a couple of creeper blitzes, one that ultimately ended up in a strip sack on the quarterback. Last season, Mac Jones had a passer rating of 79.6 when facing five or more pass rushers, which was significantly lower than the 97.9 passer rating when not facing the blitz.
The Steelers will definitely be looking to make Jones uncomfortable in his first career start in Pittsburgh.
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