This week we are previewing the game between the Pittsburgh Steelers (9-0) and the Jacksonville Jaguars (1-8) in Jacksonville. The Steelers earned a convincing 36-10 win over the Cincinnati Bengals last week while the Jaguars dropped a hard-fought 24-20 decision to the Packers in Green Bay.
Historically, the Steelers have struggled with Jacksonville. The Jags hold a 14-12 edge in their head-to-head matchups, including a 2-0 advantage in the playoffs. Pittsburgh won the most recent contest with a come-from-behind 20-16 victory in 2018 that culminated with this memorable Ben Roethlisberger stumble into the end zone for the winning score in the waning seconds:
That victory did little to erase the memory of Jacksonville’s 45-42 upset win in the 2017 playoffs at Heinz Field, a contest in which Pittsburgh was out-played, out-coached and simply out-toughed. If there is one thing that seems to be true of Jacksonville over the years, no matter their record or place in the standings, it is that they play a physical brand of football. That physicality was a problem for Pittsburgh in both 2017 and 2018.
This Jacksonville team is far different from its predecessors, however. At 1-8, they are much closer to the top pick in the draft than to the post-season. Their fan-base is actively rooting for the Jags to tank so they have a shot at one of the draft’s two elite quarterbacks, Clemson’s Trevor Lawrence or Ohio State’s Justin Fields (for an interesting take on that situation, read this). The fans don’t compete on Sundays, though, and the bevy of young players that comprise the Jacksonville roster will undoubtedly give their best as they audition for a future role with the team.
Jacksonville’s current quarterback situation is messy. Starter Gardner Minshew is out with a sprained ligament in his thumb. Backup Jake Luton piloted the team the past two weeks. Luton was impressive in his first start against Houston, going 26-38 for 304 yards. But he struggled in Green Bay, completing just 18-35 for 169 yards and taking three sacks. Third-stringer Mike Glennon has somehow defeated the Steelers twice — in 2014 when he quarterbacked Tampa Bay, and in 2017 when he led the Chicago Bears.
Jacksonville has a talented receiver in D.J. Chark, who is tall (6’4) and possesses big-play ability, while undrafted rookie James Robinson has been the focal point of the rushing attack. In true bell-cow fashion, Robinson has 155 of the team’s 200 total rushes, which equates to 78%. The Jags average just 100 yards per game on the ground, however, which ranks 26th in the league.
On defense, Jacksonville has a pair of solid linebackers in Joe Schobert and Myles Jack but not much else. They lost their second-leading tackler, safety Josh Jones, for the season with a chest injury two weeks ago. They rank 31st in the league in yards allowed per game (415.6), are 25th against the run and 29th against the pass. They are 31st in points per game (30.1) and dead last in sacks.
While, on paper, this looks like an advantageous match-up for the Steelers, history suggests the Jags will present a struggle. What will it take for Pittsburgh to win on Sunday? Here are some thoughts:
Expand the no-huddle package
Jacksonville is both young and inexperienced on defense. They start five players with three years of experience or less and four others who were drafted in the 7th round or signed as undrafted free agents. The lack of veterans and players with better pedigrees has hurt them at times and could be exploited by the Steelers with a game-plan that makes Jacksonville adjust on the fly.
Take this example from their game against Houston when, on the Texans’ second offensive play from scrimmage, they turned a harmless flat pass to receiver Brandin Cooks into a 57 yard touchdown. The call was basically a screen play, with quarterback Deshaun Watson throwing the ball immediately to Cooks and his fellow receivers blocking rather than running routes. The play should have gained five or six yards. Instead, it wound up in the end zone. Let’s take a look at what went wrong for the Jags.
Problem #1: The Jags don’t know how to align to the formation.
This is a basic 3x2 empty set. Jacksonville’s confusion stems from the fact Houston has aligned their tight end as the middle receiver to the trips at the top of the formation. In the photo below, you can see how the Jags’ defenders are scrambling to align properly and have failed to get set as the ball is being snapped:
Problem #2: The alignment issue muddies their run-fits.
Once Watson throws the quick out to Cooks, the two alley defenders cannot decide who should come under the tight end’s stalk block and who should go over top of it. One defender must track Cooks’ inside hip to take away a potential cut-back while the other must go over top of the block and chase him to the boundary. Instead, both come underneath, giving Cooks an open lane to the sideline.
Problem #3: The corner can’t get off the stalk block
This leaves the corner one-on-one with the outside receiver, who effectively stalks him, turns him inside and provides Cooks just enough room to squeeze by and sprint to the end zone:
A seemingly harmless flat pass becomes a home run because Jacksonville’s fundamentals are poor and because they cannot align properly to a 3x2 set with a slight tweak (the tight end in the slot).
Here’s another example. In the Green Bay game, the Packers aligned in an 11 personnel grouping with tight end Robert Tonyan (85) wide to the top of the formation and all three receivers in a trips configuration to the bottom. Jacksonville countered by putting both of their corners to the trips and assigning safety Andrew Wingard (42) to cover Tonyan man-to-man. Wingard was profiled here trying to cover Tennessee tight end Jonnu Smith in my preview of the Titans game a few weeks back. It seems he’s Jacksonville’s go-to player in single coverage versus opposing tight ends. The play against Smith ended badly for Wingard, as does this one. He can’t be faulted for slipping — it was raining in Green Bay and, you know, slip happens — but he is mismatched in man-coverage against tight ends. The Steelers should find a way to formation Eric Ebron on Sunday to force such a match-up with Wingard.
Pittsburgh doesn’t have to reinvent the wheel or get overly exotic to move the ball on Jacksonville. As we see above, small tweaks to their normal alignments and concepts could cause confusion or put the Jags in uncomfortable situations.
One way to do this is by evolving the no-huddle empty set that has been so good to the Steelers the past few weeks. Against Baltimore and Dallas, they used it predominantly from 01 personnel, substituting receiver Ray Ray McCloud for a running back. Last week, it came largely from 11 personnel with James Conner often split out in the slot. What wrinkle can they add this week? Will they run it from a five-receiver grouping? What about from 12 personnel? Roethlisberger has been wickedly efficient from the no-huddle, going 30-39 for 358 yards, four touchdowns and no interceptions the past three weeks. Can the Steelers evolve it further to create confusion for an inexperienced Jacksonville defense?
It may be tempting for Pittsburgh to take the position of “we’re better than them so let’s just do what we’ve been doing.” Perhaps that will work. It didn’t serve the offense particularly well two weeks ago in Dallas, however. In fact, it was the 01 package, a wrinkle they’d unveiled the previous week against Baltimore, that rescued them that day. There are tougher matchups on the horizon (Baltimore, at Buffalo) and the Steelers may not be able to beat better teams without continuing to evolve. They have to keep finding fresh coats with which to paint the foundation of their offense. An expanded no-huddle package against a Jacksonville defense short on experience and pedigree seems a great way to do so.
Get Jacksonville off the field on 3rd down
Getting underdogs like Dallas, Cincinnati and Jacksonville off the field on third downs is crucial because it prevents them from gaining momentum and getting a sense they can compete with a superior team like the Steelers. It keeps young quarterbacks from finding a rhythm and forces offensive coordinators to dig deeper into their call sheets to find plays that work. These less commonly called plays are often ones a team reps infrequently in practice and may not be as comfortable executing. The trickle-down effect of good third-down defense is significant.
Last week, against Cincinnati, the Steelers held the Bengals to a remarkable 0-13 on third downs. It was a drastic improvement from the week before, when Dallas went 8-17 in these situations. Facing the young Joe Burrow, it was anticipated Pittsburgh would bring a good deal of third-down pressure. Instead, they showed a lot of pre-snap blitz looks but fell back into coverage, forcing Burrow to hold the ball as he searched for windows in which to throw. Inevitably, this allowed pressure to get home from just four rushers up front.
Here’s an example. In the photo below, the Steelers present a pre-snap cover-1 look with a potential six-man blitz. It’s 3rd and 12, so the Bengals run a four-vert man-beater with drop-out routes from the outside receivers:
Instead, Pittsburgh rushes four and falls back into a four-under, three-deep zone. Burrow’s eyes are on the drop-outs but they are covered by the underneath defenders. His best bet is to look off the middle safety and throw to one of the slot receivers up the seam. But by the time he diagnoses the coverage, the pocket has collapsed and the rush has descended upon him. Burrow has no choice but to eat the ball for a sack:
Pittsburgh opted to disguise coverage and make Burrow hold the ball rather than to blitz him. They did the same thing in Dallas to the relatively-unknown Garrett Gilbert. But because they were often in their base defense to stop Ezekiel Elliott and the Dallas run game, their linebackers were exploited in coverage. The Steelers’ played much more nickel and dime against Cincinnati, allowing them greater freedom to mask their schemes.
How will they defend Luton? Green Bay often dropped eight into coverage against the young QB. It proved to be effective, as the Jags went just 4-13 on 3rd downs, including two sacks and a fumble. Will the Steelers follow suit and play coverage for the third week in a row against an inexperienced quarterback? Or will they re-visit the pressure packages that made them the most blitz-heavy team in the league the first seven games of the season? Mike Hilton’s status could be influential in this regard, as he is an effective blitzer from the slot. Without Hilton, they may be content to fall back and play coverage. Whatever they decide, winning 3rd downs on defense will be crucial to stamping out any momentum a young Jacksonville team might generate.
The quest for 10-0 is almost here. Grab a beverage and your Terrible Towel. As always, go Steelers!