Friday Football Footnotes: Beyond stopping the run, here’s everything else the Steelers need to do to beat the Ravens
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The analysis of the Baltimore Ravens’ 16-14 victory over the Pittsburgh Steelers on Dec. 11 was pretty simple.
Baltimore ran the ball down the throats of the Steelers. To the tune of 215 yards.
But Baltimore does that to a lot of teams — with or without Lamar Jackson at quarterback. At 166 yards per game on the ground, the Ravens lead the AFC in rushing and are second overall in the NFL, trailing only the Chicago Bears (179.7 yards per game). So whatever the Steelers do to concentrate on slowing the Ravens’ ground game, Baltimore may still be able to do some damage in that regard.
As a result, the Steelers need to make a difference in other areas where they fell short against the Ravens last time out. For this week’s “Friday Football Footnotes,” here are a few potential areas of improvement the Steelers can make against their AFC rivals on both sides of the ball.
Get a turnover
One turnover. At least. Is that asking too much?
In Game 1, the Ravens intercepted Steelers backup quarterback Mitch Trubisky three times. The Steelers couldn’t generate a single turnover against either of Baltimore’s backup QBs (Tyler Huntley and Anthony Brown).
You might think that just 17 combined pass attempts from those two wouldn’t equate to many opportunities from interceptions.
You’d be right.
But how about recovering a fumble or two during their 42 rush attempts? Kenyan Drake and Huntley both fumbled in that game earlier this month, and the Steelers failed to recover either one. The Steelers lead the NFL in interceptions with 17 but are dead last in recovering fumbles with three.
The Steelers don’t want to sacrifice sound fundamental tackling in the hope of stripping the ball. But it sure would be nice to rip one free.
“We’re trying to tackle. Let’s get them on the ground. But I think there’s always a ball-search component every time you go to make a tackle,” Steelers defensive coordinator Teryl Austin said Thursday. “There’s a way to make a tackle and try to search for the ball at the same time. We always work on that. It just really right now hasn’t gone our way.”
The Steelers’ three primary inside linebackers (Robert Spillane, Myles Jack and Devin Bush) have no interceptions, forced fumbles or fumble recoveries. The only sack generated by the three of them was from Spillane back in Week 1 against the Cincinnati Bengals.
Don’t turn it over
At least fewer than three times. Is that asking too much?
That’s what the Steelers did against the Ravens last time. Granted, Kenny Pickett will be back at quarterback instead of Trubisky, who played fast and loose with some throws over the middle against a Ravens team that isn’t far behind the Steelers in interceptions (14).
Meanwhile, Pickett has thrown just one interception in his last six games.
“That’s why we work every day,” coach Mike Tomlin said of Pickett’s growth. “We’re really intentional about the environment that we create. It’s reasonable to expect guys to get better.”
If Pickett can clone what Trubisky did (aside from the three interceptions) to get 276 yards on 22-of-30 passing, then maybe they’ll be onto something.
Zoning in
Steelers offensive players spent a lot of time this week talking about the heavy amount of zone defense the Ravens played in that first meeting. It was a departure from the usual dose of man-to-man, blitz-heavy schemes the Ravens used to run under former coordinator Don “Wink” Martindale.
“That’s what more teams are going to, especially when you are good at it, when you’ve got backers that can cover underneath like they do,” Trubisky said of the Ravens’ zone defense. “They do a good job in their zone drops. They do a good job of spinning the back end. You don’t know if it is one-high or two-high until post snap. So you are making the quarterback read out the defense.”
Receiver Diontae Johnson said the Steelers need to improve play calling and execution against zone defenses in general, but specifically this week against the Ravens
More from Tim Benz:
• Tim Benz: Where the Steelers must improve their rush defense against the Ravens
• U mad, bro?: Steelers fans snap back at criticism of Kenny Pickett and go after Matt Canada, defensive payroll
• Tim Benz: Why Mike Tomlin is so enthusiastic about flexed kickoff vs. Baltimore
“We’ve got to beat a lot more zone coverages this week. We’ve been seeing a lot of zone lately. It’s not beating the man-to-man problems. It’s, in those weighty moments, do we have the right plays dialed up to beat zone coverage. Coach (Tomlin) was harping on that (Monday) in our team meeting — beating zone coverages.”
Canada said sharpening the minutiae of execution against zone defenses is largely about timing.
“We’ve talked about that all week,” Canada said. “As we continue to grow, we’re making a lot of strides with the details and being at the right place at the right time — everybody being on the same page and understanding when to sit, when to clear. We saw a fair amount (of zone). They’re good at it.”
Part of the reason why the Ravens have gotten proficient at running those zone defenses is the acquisition of Roquan Smith. He and fellow inside linebacker Patrick Queen have made a formidable tandem. Queen and Smith had two of the three interceptions against Trubisky in that game, two of which were attempts to force passes over the middle to tight end Pat Freiermuth.
“Their linebackers are great covering the middle of the field,” tight end Zach Gentry said. “Man-to-man. Zone. They are natural at dropping, reading the quarterback’s eyes. Passing things off. Having those two guys definitely makes their defense go.”
Red zone
The Steelers had two red-zone touchdowns against Baltimore. But Trubisky had one interception in the red zone. Another came from the Baltimore 23. And the third was intercepted in the end zone.
Plus, Chris Boswell had a field-goal miss on a drive that got into the red zone, then regressed from the 19-yard line. So they’ve got to do better on the occasions when they do make it deep into Baltimore territory.
“Being young is not an excuse,” Canada said of his red-zone offense. “We’ve got to produce. Those things have to happen. But I think we’re getting closer. We’re making more of them. But we just have got to get them all.”
Neither team is particularly good in the red zone this year. The Steelers are 17th at 53.3% in red zone efficiency. Baltimore is 30th at 46.3%. Indianapolis (43.9%) and New England (38.5%) are the only teams who rank worse than the Ravens.
You can run too
The Ravens don’t have to be the only team on the field that’s good at running the football.
The Steelers currently average 115.4 yards per game on the ground. That’s 18th in the NFL. The Ravens only allow 87.5 yards per game on the ground. That’s third best in the league.
But that doesn’t mean the Steelers shouldn’t try to run. Najee Harris and Jaylen Warren only combined for 15 carries in the first game against the Ravens. And it doesn’t mean that the Steelers can’t be better than 3.3 yards per carry when they do try.
“We just have to be better with the fundamentals,” guard James Daniels said. “If you watch the last game (against Baltimore), I don’t think we ran the ball that well. We’ve been doing the same run plays all year. In the games we executed, we played together. We had great technique. Games we didn’t execute — like last time against them — we didn’t do those things.”
The longest run for either Harris or Warren during that Dec. 11 game at Acrisure Stadium was 8 yards.
In Friday’s “Breakfast With Benz” podcast, Mitch Trubisky talks to Tim Benz about areas of improvement the Steelers offense can make in Round 2 versus the Ravens, after learning from mistakes — and positives — they experienced when he played in Game 1 of the rivalry.