The Weirdest Team in the NFL
Does it ever feel like the Pittsburgh Steelers find a way to win games that they have no business being in? If you’ve ever watched a Steelers game, you’d think that there’s no way on God’s green earth that this team, who is the only team in the NFL to be outgained in every game this season, should be 5-3 with a 2-0 division record. Yet, they are. Year after year, led by Mike Tomlin, the Steelers find a way to finish with a winning record with subpar talent and a static Matt Canada-orchestrated offense, and it’s because they have a system that, somehow, someway, never fails them.
In the past two seasons, Pittsburgh, despite winning seasons in which they finished red hot, were 13th and 24th in DVOA. The season before, they were 11-0, but finished 9th in DVOA. This season, they are 5-3 and have the 5th seed in the AFC, yet they are 20th in DVOA—the worst of any team in playoff position.
Despite having a winning record in every one of these seasons, Pittsburgh is also 25th in point differential this year, was 24th last season, and was 22nd in the year before.
Part of the reason for this has been their ugly play through the first three quarters of most games. This season, Pittsburgh has entered the fourth quarter trailing in seven of their eight contests. However, they’ve been terrific in the 4th.
As you can see, their scoring has increased in each quarter of the game. It hasn’t come in garbage time either. Four of their five wins have come courtesy of game-winning drives, orchestrated by Kenny Pickett, who has more game winning drives than everyone since the start of his career aside from Kirk Cousins.
26-22 vs Browns: Go-ahead TD with 6:58 remaining
17-10 vs Ravens: Go-ahead TD with 1:14 remaining.
24-17 vs Rams: Go-ahead TD with 7:20 remaining.
20-16 vs Titans: Go-ahead TD with 4:02 remaining.
If you think this says a lot, wait until you see the same version, but for the 2021 Steelers, who were 4-13 through the first three quarters of games. They were a whopping 13-1-2 in the fourth quarter.
Tomlin’s magical motivation late in games led the Steelers to the playoffs that year by means of numerous go-ahead/game-winning plays in the 4th quarter.
23-16 vs Bills: Go-ahead TD with 11:19 remaining.
23-20 OT vs Seahawks: Game-winning FG as time expired.
15-10 vs Browns: Go-ahead TD with 11:04 remaining.
29-27 vs Bears: Go-ahead TD with 0:26 remaining.
20-19 vs Ravens: Go-ahead TD and 2-pt conversion with 1:48 remaining.
19-13 vs Titans: Go-ahead FG with 7:20 remaining.
16-13 vs Ravens: Game-winning FG as time expired.
Shockingly, in each one of these games, Pittsburgh had a sub-35% chance of winning.
vs BUF (10.6%), vs SEA (29.0%), vs CLE (23.3%), vs CHI (34.2%), vs BAL (15.6%), vs TEN (10.7%), vs BAL (11.3%).
For some visual perspective, here’s what the typical Steeler win looked like in 2021. The line represents the chance that the teams have of winning. For instance, in the first graph, the Bills had at least a 60% chance of winning until about 12 minutes left in the fourth quarter, when the Steelers became favored.
Now, here’s the 2023 version.
You’ll notice that one team has been victim to not just the most Pittsburgh comeback wins, but also the most improbable ones. That team is their AFC North foe: the Baltimore Ravens. As a Ravens fan, it’s no secret to me that the Steelers have beaten us in six out of our last seven meetings, but it’s how they’ve done it that makes our defeat so torturous.
Baltimore has led entering the fourth quarter in five of the seven games.
Pittsburgh has outscored Baltimore in the fourth quarter by 68-26.
Pittsburgh’s average margin of victory is just 3.83 points.
Baltimore has outgained Pittsburgh by 2267-2159 yards.
In five of the six Baltimore losses, they had 90.2%, 82.4%, 88.7%, 84.4%, and 85.2% chances of winning at some point in the games.
Every game has been decided by one score, contributing to Pittsburgh’s unbelievable 27-7 record in one score games since 2020.
The bottom line is that no matter the competition, no matter the deficit, and no matter how bad the Steelers are, they consistently find ways to win that few other teams can at half the rate of the Steelers. There is no panic in this Mike Tomlin led team. There is, rather, trust that even though they might play like the 2017 Browns for 55 minutes, they can flip a switch and score ten points in the last five minutes. Pittsburgh’s system is obviously flawed—ideally, you’d want to play well for 60 minutes—, but it’s the reason that you can never count them out. The Steelers will always be alive, no matter how thin the ice is.