Coach Mike Tomlin believes it won’t take his team long to right the ship. Their next chance to do so will be in front of a national audience, when the Steelers host the division rival Browns on Monday night.
The march will not be easy. The Browns simply look pretty good one game into Jim Schwartz’s tenure as Cleveland’s defensive coordinator. Cleveland’s defense dominated in the Browns’ 24-3 win over the Cincinnati Bengals in Week 1, limiting Joe Burrow, the NFL’s new highest-paid player, to just 82 passing yards and the worst completion percentage. expected of his career. (-13.9 percent), according to Next Gen Stats.
Meanwhile, the Browns’ renewed pass rush made for a nightmare day for Burrow, sacking him twice and pressuring him on 36.4 percent of dropbacks. On such plays, Burrow completed just 2 of 10 passes for 22 yards and a passer rating of 39.6, only slightly worse than his overall passer rating of 52.2.
“To be frank, I thought the cornerbacks won them the game last week,” Tomlin said, via the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. “I thought their ability to stay at the line of scrimmage and challenge the Cincinnati Bengals was really impressive.”
Pickett worked hard during Pittsburgh’s loss, throwing two interceptions in a pass-heavy game. He knows he missed some early opportunities and made some avoidable mistakes. He’s also well aware of the fact that he can’t afford another failed outing if the Steelers hope to get back on track.
Tomlin knows better than to think this is the beginning of a free fall toward irrelevance for the young quarterback.
“There’s justice in football when you work at it, man,” Tomlin said of Pickett. “Usually, you get good things. This is a guy who is completely committed. This is a guy who works hard and, to a large extent, those guys create his own fortune.
“It’s reasonable to expect guys who work the way he works and prepare the way he prepares to bounce back from a negative performance. Individually and collectively, I expect this group to do similar things.”
The good news is that it’s only Week 1 for the Steelers. Sixteen more games await them, including a suddenly important meeting with the Browns. If Pickett is going to live up to the high expectations you have for him after a solid preseason performance, he can make a big statement by finding a way to be successful against a defense that’s off to a good start.
