Unbelievable Statistic

Hi Everyone.

I had my suspicions, but last night’s commentator (maybe Collingsworth) confirmed this. We led the league this season in throwing the ball short of the first down marker on third downs. WOW! I mean I realized we did a lot of “dink” and “dunk”. However, that is completely “mind-boggling” as well as “pathetic”.

Again, as both a rhetorical question and a statement, I have to believe that this is a Cause and Effect of a brand new revamped Offensive Line and Matt Canada? Totally “Disgraceful” as well as “Disgusting”.



STEELWINDS The East Side Kid

 

There's nothing John Madden hated more than throwing short of the sticks on 3rd... except maybe when the side official gives a left foot spot when he should be giving a right foot spot.

Ben is one of the last QBs it made sense to play this style of offense with. I'm impressed he did it this well without complaining. (Not this season but 2020 and 2018)

Ben went from game manager to gunslinger to dink and dunker. Kind of did it all.

 

I think it has more to do with a poor offensive line that cannot protect long enough for receivers to run longer routes and create separation combined with an immobile QB that cannot make up for the poor offensive line play. It's not just one thing:

Average to below average receivers + poor offensive line + immobile QB + rookie OC = 2021 Steelers offense

Tell me what longer pass plays you think will work when your 39 year old QB has < 1.5 seconds to throw?

By the way, I watched every playoff game this weekend and all of them threw short of the sticks on 3rd and long on a a lot of the plays, not all of them, but a lot.

 

Teams seem to have the ability to dump the ball off to the RB on us and they run for 20 yards? I'm completely dumbfounded by it!

There was something up with our offense. Knowing who Ben is, his instincts are not to throw short. Unless he changed, and he just refused to get hit this year no matter the circumstances.

 

How many plays did defensive players go unimpeded right at Ben? Huge holes with no one in them to stop or block. This is not a talent thing but a game preparation and mental breakdown part of the game for the OL. On the one play they replayed from behind Ben, the hole was so big that 2 defensive players came in at a sprint and no one to stop them. Right up the center of the line. How does that happen?

 

I could not believe we did not use Harris in the passing game. Maybe he was more hurt than they were letting on or Canada truly is a moron. When we get Harris involved in catching balls we get first downs. He caught 2 balls for -2 yards.

The NFL is a copy cat league. Most teams are throwing more short high % passes. But when you have no running game and you constantly find your self in 3rd and long you have no choice but to open your QB up to getting killed in obvious passing situations. The comical thing was early in the game we were twice 3rd and 2 and we threw bombs to covered WR's running a basic go route. Talk about low percentage play in a situation were we desperately needed a to sustain a drive. Unreal how bad this OC is.

Harris is awesome in the open field. He is an absolute miss match in the secondary so why the hell are we not feeding him the ball w/ quick 5 yard passes? He's a far better runner than any of our WR's and he breaks tackles. Our WR's (if they actually catch it) are easy tackles, half the time they trip or just fall down making moves. Maybe if we made defenses worry about Harris in the passing game it would also free up Pat and our WR's to run deeper routes? The game plan for the chiefs was shockingly bad. Our only truly reliable pass catchers are Pat and Harris. Yet week after week we watch DJ and Claypool drop balls, quit on routes, run the wrong plays, fall down, miss read defenses and miss play balls. We have not scored a TD in the first half 7 out of the last 8 games. Think about that for a minute.

 

Funny, I was OK with us not throwing those short behind the line of scrimmage passes to Harris on 3rd and 8; that Canada loved to do during the regular season.

 

I think they said we did it 98 times this season.

Dan Marino once said if it’s third down and you aren’t past the first down marker, I’m not throwing you the ball.

 

Chris Collingsworth is a tool.

 

i wasn’t talking about screens. I was talking about actual forward passes. Like we used to use Bell.

 

Why would you be dumbfounded by it? You’ve watched it happen since midway through the 2020 season. Ben’s arm is shot. He can’t throw deep anymore. Whenever he tries it’s short the vast majority of the time. Opposing teams know it. It’s been put on film repeatedly. They don’t have to respect the deep ball so they sell out to stop everything underneath.

 

It is not just the deep ball though. He would throw short on a 3rd and 5? It is almost like the coaches are forcing him to do it?

Yeah Ben's deep ball is most likely not what it was ... but going back to the Chargers and Vikings game, he was airing it out there. Batch said they took the ability to audible at the line this year. I think Ben was partially handcuffed.

 

Everyone living on one quarter of football. You watched ben audible repeatedly last night. Yes. Our offensive line was poor, but so is Ben. He was a large part of the problem in 2020 and 2021. It’s blatantly obvious.

 

Would like to see a stat if available. How many times does a QB not see an open receiver? Would like to know if poor passing game for us in 2021 was due mostly to Ben.

Basically, some stat that proves QB not seeing the field, not seeing best available play. Would be useful if in context QB has time to make the throw and makes shorter throw or no throw or throws away ball. Just looking for an indicator proving QB can`t read the field very well. Indicator QB is mentally slow.

 

Who is this Chris Collingsworth everyone is talking about?

 

Ben never regained the strength in his throwing arm that he had prior to the elbow injury. I think it's why he didn't want to use the middle of the field. Most of his 20+ yard passes lacked velocity and I started to get a bad feeling when he did throw an intermediate or deep ball. Sometimes it appeared that he could really unload on a throw, but it was usually inconsistent. You could tell almost from the beginning of the 2020 season that he simply did not want to get hit anymore. In my estimation, the poor line play in tandem with an aging, fragile QB who lacked arm strength formed the (im)perfect storm that this offense sadly morphed into.

 

This.

We've all heard a scout say about a prospect, "He can make all the throws." After the elbow surgery, that wasn't Ben. He could make only some of the throws. Anything that required zip just wasn't available and that includes intermediate passes down the middle. You lollipop those and it's either intercepted or your receiver clocked.

 

This has been a problem for several years now. And then out of nowhere, there's a huge downfield pass on 3rd and 1 that fails the majority of the time. It just doesn't make sense. With rare exceptions, just focus on getting the first down in that situation.

 

Did you see Ben attempt to throw long last game? Either 5 yards short or airmail, and the only time the second happened was on the slant to Juju. Nothing really close. Washington made a good play on the last td drive, but two yards further and that pass was a td.

 

You blame Ben, I am not a betting man as I tend to enjoy keeping my money, but I would be willing to bet if Mason or Haskins played all year, we dont make the playoffs all things being equal. Ben was the reason we made the playoffs period. I am not saying Ben isnt done as I clearly believe he is, but the thing that has to be acknowledged is that Ben was the best QB on that team and it wasnt even close.

 

How many times has Ben done that though? It's pretty normal. I bet he's killed at least one drive per game throwing deep on 3rd and short. Guaranteed he set the record for taking a sack that puts the team out of FG position.

That's Ben though. Cowher/Whiz minimized his mistakes by minimizing the short and intermediate throws. They tried not to take away his big play ability.

Tomlin/Canada minimized the mistakes by throwing extremely conservative passes. There were very few attempts at big plays just go routes down the sideline that Ben rarely gave his receiver a chance at.

 

inexperienced practice squad players starting is how that happens. then factor in piss poor coaching and preparation.

 

I've got to believe that Ben had an injury that we don't know about, I can think of no other reason for this offensive offense. Even teams with bad o-lines, rookie qbs, average recievers, etc., will throw deep, throw down the seem, throw deep over the middle. What we saw this year was beyond pathetic.

 

I watched that happen to several teams during wild card weekend, it's not just the Steelers it happens to.

 

He's been playing through both a pec and shoulder injury to his throwing arm. I just assumed it was that.