It's the players, not the plays. Or maybe you've heard it explained this way: The Jimmys and Joes are more important than the Xs and Os.
The Steelers are now 7-4 following Sunday's 16-10 win over the Bengals in Cincinnati, and as Bill Cowher once said after something that looked similar, "It was no Mozart."
Indeed, there was nothing artistic about what happened on the floor of Paycor Stadium, but what happened was important for two significant reasons: It was a win, on the road against a division opponent, and it was achieved in no small part because their plan on offense was more about the players – both Pittsburgh's and Cincinnati's – than the plays.
"I thought we spread the ball around, we changed things up schematically with different launch points," said Coach Mike Tomlin. "We attacked down the field early when they were in split safeties. We weren't going to let them sit in that comfortably all day. We did what we needed to do."
And they didn't wait very long at all to start. The Bengals won the toss and elected to defer, which meant the Steelers offense would be on the field first once Evan McPherson did the expected and blasted the opening kickoff through the end zone for a touchback.
The starting 11 included three wide receivers – Diontae Johnson, Allen Robinson, George Pickens – plus Najee Harris at running back and Pat Freiermuth was the tight end. If you had tuned in to this show each week of the 2023 regular season, your impression would be that of the possible combinations of all of those options the least likely to get the football would be Freiermuth. But then also factor in the location of the field and the depth of the pass, it virtually qualified as a gadget play. Twenty-four yards to the Steelers 49-yard line, and the defender was Logan Wilson, an every-down linebacker who's the best and most consistent player on that unit.
"Yeah, playing off of what they were showing defensively," said Kenny Pickett about how quickly and frequently and where the Steelers were utilizing Freiermuth, who finished with 9 catches on 11 targets for 120 yards. "It felt like they were showing a lot of middle-field open coverages, where we need Pat to step up and be big for us, which he was. Having some one-on-one routes to move the chains. I think Pat had an unbelievable game. Really happy for him. (He was) battling back from an injury with his hamstring, which isn't easy. So, it's great to have No. 88 out there."
No argument, but even more significant than getting Freiermuth involved early in the passing attack was trusting Pickett to make it happen. The ball was delivered on target and on time, and with a touch and accuracy that has been more of a hope than a reality with Pickett this season.
Pickett would go on to complete 72.7 percent (his season-high by almost 5 percent), with an 8.4 yards-per-attempt (tied for his second-best this season), and 278 yards (his season-high by 43 yards). Add in no turnovers, good patience and command in the pocket, and it was his best overall performance of the season.
"We did what we needed to do to win," said Tomlin. "Guys like me and Kenny, we're judged based on winning and losing, and we don't run from that, we run to that. He and I are winners today."
The decision to replace Matt Canada 10 games into the season – itself a historic event in franchise history – also was being cast as a referendum on Pickett. Cumulative statistics were showing that Pickett was lagging behind other young starting quarterbacks at similar stages of their careers. But Pickett was supposed to be able to compensate in other ways, with the kind of intangibles that had been judged to be significant enough to make him worthy of the 20th overall pick in a draft. His grit. His fight. His belief and the ability to convince his teammates to believe. Getting that part of his game back on track deserved to be seen as the important component of his development it was.
Against the Bengals, Pickett handled the postgame microphone well, too. "Like I always say, it's the ultimate team game, especially offensively. You need everybody — all 11 working together, all 11 on the same page in order to be successful. So, for myself and the guys in the locker room, we're all really happy that we're coming out of here with the 'W,' coming back to (Acrisure Stadium) this coming weekend. It should be awesome to get back home. A lot of positive takes from it."
Another development in the "positive takes" category was Najee Harris getting back to being the tone-setting running back he can and needs to be. With Harris, the number of offensive snaps and touches within those snaps are not necessarily as significant as utilizing him to set a tone for the offense. And keeping his shoulders square to the line of scrimmage while getting him there clean highlight his strengths and maximize his impact. His 15 carries for 99 yards contained little negativity – one 1-yard loss and one no gain – and included chunks of 20, 23, and 13 yards plus a 5-yard touchdown.
Harris, like Pickett, was a first-round investment, and like Pickett is a developing leader on offense. He is another asset to be nurtured and then utilized. Sunday represented a step in the right direction for him as well.
But returning to the phrase Cowher had used during his days as the head coach, 16-10 in Cincinnati was "no Mozart." And it was that because the Steelers were not finishing drives, they were failing at most significant of their marching orders. "Score more points."
A first quarter possession ended with a lost fumble at the Bengals 13-yard line. Another time in the first half the offense drove 66 yards in 8 plays that included a 20-yard run by Harris and a 39-yard pretty pass to Diontae Johnson only to fizzle out at the Bengals 23-yard line where Chris Boswell bailed them out with a 43-yard field goal. Another time they converted a third-and-9 with a pass to Diontae Johnson and a subsequent third-and-8 with a 43-yard completion to George Pickens yet still had to settle for a red zone field goal.
Certainly the offense is going to need to finish drives better and more consistently, but unlike the previous Sunday in Cleveland, in Cincinnati there actually were some drives to finish.
It all added up to a bounce-back victory that put them at 7-4, second in the division and fifth in the conference, a 16-10 victory that provided enough grist for the optimists and pessimists alike.
In short, a typical Steelers Sunday.
