If you’re a Steelers fan you know the story of training camp thus far: The defense has performed exceptionally well while the offense has struggled.
Al Saunders explained that “ defense has taken the “offense’s lunch money whenever it wanted to.”
Jim Wexell quoted Mike Tomlin as calling “’a really big day, kind of the culmination of a big week for us,’ but it was another fizzle by the offense.”
Mike DeFabo laid out 4 overarching concerns about the Steelers offense supported by detailed dissections of Arthur Smith unit’s struggles in “7 on 7 Shots” and on the goal line drill.
How, pray tell, should Steelers navigate this no man’s land between hope for the defense and despair over the offense?
Jack Sawyer and Malik Harrison force an Evan Hull fumble in 7 on 7 shots. Photo Credit: Chaz Palla, Tribune-Review
Is it already too early write 2025 off as yet another year when Mike Tomlin “wasted a great defense,” failing to capitalize on T.J. Watt’s prime while cheating Cam Heyward?
Of course it is.
And there’s proof. To find it you need to look back to past summers at St. Vincents. Fear not. There’s no need return Joe Greene doing the Oklahoma Drill in 1969, or Chuck Noll installing the shotgun July 1989, or even Ben Roethlisberger turning heads as a rookie in the summer of 2004.
- You don’t even need to go back before the pandemic.
You only need look back to this point in the summer of 2023. Of course we all remember how flawless the Steelers looked in preseason that August. This skeptical scribe even allowed himself to nip at the Kool Aid.
Of course preseason was a mirage. But what were they saying before the preseason started?
Everyone’s forgotten. Including me. Fortunately, thanks to the magic of the internet we can look it up.
2023 = 365 Days of Summer @ St. Vincents
Roy Countryman traveled to St. Vincents and had this to say on August 9th, 2023:
* Kenny Pickett is processing his reads quickly, and with the added muscle he put on during the offseason it allows him to uncork passes into tight windows with just a shade more velocity.
*The Steelers offense has a plethora of weaponry, and should have the option to get creative with play-calling, especially in red zone scenarios with versatile players such as Connor Heyward and Kendrick Green. There should be no excuse they are not a top 10 team in red zone efficiency.
Wooh. Roy Countryman is easily one of the best Steelers-focused draft analysts in the business, but those to observations didn’t age well.
But Countryman was in good company. His boss at Steel City Insider, Jim Wexell offered this on August 6th. After detailing his efforts to secure an excellent one-on-one with George Pickens, he widened his focus to the rest of the offense offering this:
…. combined with the precise Diontae Johnson, the receiving corps – with savvy veteran Allen Robinson scoring once again in 7 Shots – is picking up steam with quarterback Kenny Pickett.
The raves began pouring in Friday night, and Saturday afternoon the Steelers’ passing game reached its offseason apex. It might be time to get excited.
For real.
A few days later after the Steelers cleaned Tampa Bay’s clock in preseason, the excitement did start to get real.
And there were reasons for things to be real, one of those was Wexell’s assessment of Broderick Jones:
But there’s more to the excitement, and part of it is the infusion of that freakish Georgia talent. Joining Pickens this season from the ruling kings of college ball is first-round pick Broderick Jones, who looks to one day put a decade-long stranglehold on the very difficult and very important left tackle position.
Now, here comes the part of the article where the author admits to exercising artistic license earlier in the piece: I lied about not remembering the reports from training camp 2023.
I remembered the positive vibes coming out of St. Vincents two summers ago, but I wanted to confirm my memory and find concrete examples to offer as evidence. While that’s part of the craft of any good writer, it also reminds us that research often yields unintended insights.
Wolfley’s View
The late, great Craig Wolfley published his own piece on Steel City Insider on August 8th of 2023. While Wofley’s take was overall positive, he didn’t paint his picture broad strokes that his follow writers at Steel City Insider did.
- Instead, he honed in on individual players.
Wolfley sang the praises of George Pickens, predicted Keeanu Benton’s strong rookie year, and gave a special shout-out to rookie Nick Herbig. He also was positive on Borderick Jones, but Wofley warned, “he still has a tendency to give away the inside pass rush.”
Wolfley’s observations about each player were pretty close to spot on. And that tells us something important, beyond reminding us of how lucky we were to have Wolf and how much we miss him.
It really just goes to show you that training camp evaluations are as much of an art as they are a science.
Daily battle reports from training camp are since part of it, as they represent hard snapshots taken in real time. The ability to stich those together, that’s where the art lies. And Craig Wolfley had an uncanny knack that surpassed the rest of his peers.
Image credit: Sybildeckerdf via Pin Interest
So yes, the Steelers defense has looked good so far, and yes the offense has taken its time to find its footing. While that might not be encouraging, its hardly surprising as that’s the side of the ball that’s seen the most turnover.
So if you’re feeling bad about the direction of the Steelers offense, just think back to how good you felt about it two summers ago, let the feelings balance out. When you get the that point, remind yourself of Chuck Noll’s credo that “Life is a journey” and enjoy the ride.
