Right and Wrong: Offense

[Dcash4]

Just revisiting as I found something interesting in terms of separation last season  Johnson actually lead all NFL receivers in separation. That’s the kind of stuff that’s super important on this team full of combat catch guys. 

DJ will be the 1 on this team. JuJu has chemistry and will still eat a large target share, but game on the line, 3rd and 5 getting man’ed up....Johnson’s the guy you want.

also, the goal was for you guys to also share your right and wrongs 😉

 

[MOSteelers56]

I feel like a big time homer, but I really think the one major thing that can go wrong with the offense is Ben. I don’t want to sound overly optimistic, but our offense is top 10 with a healthy Ben, I’d say even at 90% of what he was the year before the injury. We have too many weapons and potential for variety. I suppose if Fitchner completely implodes that could doom us as well. I do have a critique for that, though. If Ben is healthy, Fitchner is nothing but a cheerleader. If Ben’s healthy, were a contender, if not, we’re going to be at best an 8 win team.

For the things we can do right, just pick your poison. We’ve got the deepest, most versatile, group of RBs we’ve had in years. We’ve got a physical offensive line, that will improve from last year. I think the loss of Foster(as important as he was in the lockerroom) is addition by subtraction, regardless of who is at LG. Wiz, Feiler, the Rookie, will all be at least as good as Foster was last year. All will be more athletic, and can help AV more than Foster could. We’ve got matchup problems at TE now with Ebron. I know it was  small sample size, but look at how Ben used Ladarius Green. Vance will improve if he’s healthy because Ben can progress through his reads and actually find underneath guys that Mason and Duck simply couldn’t do. Our WRs are stacked. We’ve got deep threats in Cain and Claypool. I really hope they keep Cain over Switzer, because we’re deep in the slot and thin outside. We’ve got strong possession guys like JuJu and Washington. Plus a great route runner in DJ. 

I wish we had a little more depth at TE, but I understand you can’t be 6 deep with all stars at every position. 

[Dcash4]

1 hour ago, MOSteelers56 said:

I feel like a big time homer, but I really think the one major thing that can go wrong with the offense is Ben. I don’t want to sound overly optimistic, but our offense is top 10 with a healthy Ben, I’d say even at 90% of what he was the year before the injury.

I thought a lot about Ben and the reason I am confident in our offense this year is because I believe any form of Ben will win us more games.

If we scored 22 points a game last year, we win three more games. We had three more games against playoff teams go down to the final possession. That’s 6 games impacted by just having hots or just understanding audibles.  22 points per game would have ranked 18th last year. I don’t know that I would say we will be top ten, but if we are even just top 16 - top half of the league - we will immediately be a playoff team. 

As an 8-8 team who ranked 27th in the league in scoring at 18 per game, that 4 points swing brings us between 10-14 wins. To be, that’s Ben doing the bare minimum last year, so I’m super pumped for whatever return he brings. 

Its why I don’t get so many media people seemingly sleeping on the Steelers. I don’t think they understand how little we needed from an offense that collapsed to not only be in the playoffs, but contending for a bye. 

[MOSteelers56]

I definitely think our defense will regress, that may be something to think about in regards to the media sleeping on us. The defense almost assuredly can not take the ball away as many times as last year. Add in a QB with injury concerns, and we might be downright bad. I used to be kind of confident in Mason as the backup, but I’m talking myself into swinging for a top tier backup. I think we’re a fringe SB contender roster, with a good QB. I’d kick the tires on Cam honestly. 

[Dcash4]

2 hours ago, MOSteelers56 said:

I definitely think our defense will regress, that may be something to think about in regards to the media sleeping on us. The defense almost assuredly can not take the ball away as many times as last year. Add in a QB with injury concerns, and we might be downright bad. I used to be kind of confident in Mason as the backup, but I’m talking myself into swinging for a top tier backup. I think we’re a fringe SB contender roster, with a good QB. I’d kick the tires on Cam honestly. 

I agree on turnover regression, but I think it’s going to be more of an even swap at the end of the day. We barely scored off any turnovers that we actually did create, with Ben that’s a different world. I, largely, expect our defense to continually stop people from scoring despite less turnovers — I just think we will take advantage offensively more this year. 

[turtle28]

4 hours ago, Dcash4 said:

I thought a lot about Ben and the reason I am confident in our offense this year is because I believe any form of Ben will win us more games.

If we scored 22 points a game last year, we win three more games. We had three more games against playoff teams go down to the final possession. That’s 6 games impacted by just having hots or just understanding audibles.  22 points per game would have ranked 18th last year. I don’t know that I would say we will be top ten, but if we are even just top 16 - top half of the league - we will immediately be a playoff team. 

As an 8-8 team who ranked 27th in the league in scoring at 18 per game, that 4 points swing brings us between 10-14 wins. To be, that’s Ben doing the bare minimum last year, so I’m super pumped for whatever return he brings. 

Its why I don’t get so many media people seemingly sleeping on the Steelers. I don’t think they understand how little we needed from an offense that collapsed to not only be in the playoffs, but contending for a bye. 

I 100% agree with this, and not only was Ben hurt, but also Conner, Juju & Tuitt, that’s a lot of top talent to miss for multiple games. It’s amazing they went 8-8 last year and were a game from making the playoffs.

It’s easy to predict 2 to 4 more wins this year, given health w/ Pitt & Balt battling it out for the Div Champ once again, a bye week in the playoffs and a home playoff game in the Divisional round.

[SteelersFan2333]

I can see us either getting a first round bye, or failing to even make the playoffs. I think it’s one of those weird seasons that we’re real good, or real bad, and it all falls on Ben. If he gets hurt again or isn’t fully recovered I can see the team just deflating. To know you can be one of the best teams but losing your QB when the front office does nothing to remedy the problem after what we went through last year is a huge mental challenge to the rest of the team. I think Mason made some progress but once he took the big hit it’s like he was starting all over. If we had a decent backup last year we would have been in the playoffs and it will be the same this year. Hopefully the FO realizes that and does something to correct it before the season. Out window is rapidly closing, and not just from Ben. Hayward, Connor, Juju, AV, Pouncey, and Haden could all be gone or aging out. Heck even Decastro will be 31 this year. Not all these guys are stars but they’re all integral without starters behind them. 

[Shady Slim]

not expecting for ben to be back to his best straight away but i do think even a rusty week 1 ben will do better than mason or duck hodges... and then as ben really gets in to his groove and ideally we have the defense firing, continuing to have the chemistry they did last year, we are a bowl contender.

ideally, unless we have the defense regressing really far, the fact that our offense should be able to move the chains and stay ahead of the game better means we won't have to lean on the d so much for big plays. our d was aces with short fields all year so imagine what they'll do when they have the full park up their sleeves this season tbh

[3rivers]

if Connor can stay healthy, he is a very good RB and will put up stats. Too bad the injury bug hits, but last season was a problem on offence in other ways too.  Ben, Claypool, maybe JuJu if healthy and if the OL is still good, it should be a good season for the steelers