Football Footnotes: Steelers are 4-2 -- but are they in a better spot than a year ago?

The Pittsburgh Steelers are 4-2 through six games so far in 2024. They were 4-2 through six games in 2023 as well.

Before we knew it, though, the Steelers were 6-4 and eventually 7-7 and fighting for their playoff lives. On the surface, my hunch is that the Steelers are currently in a better spot.

But are they? Really? On Tuesday, Steelers head coach Mike Tomlin didn’t provide much of an opinion.

“We’ve had so much fluidity in terms of who’s available to us,” Tomlin said. “We’ve been having some real issues regarding putting together a plan that’s appropriate for the people at our disposal. Sometimes immediate needs and concerns override the self-scouting or the balancing component that’s associated with self-scout.

“We’ve been operating under less than ideal circumstances on both sides of the ball and in special teams, and so that’s where my energies have been.”

If Tomlin doesn’t want to go there, we can. For this Friday’s “Football Footnotes,” let’s try to figure out if 4-2 for the Steelers this year is better than it was last year.

On offense

This year’s edition of the Steelers is averaging 20.6 points per game. Last year’s was at 17.1 (with a pair of defensive touchdowns and a few more directly set up by the “D”).

While the Steelers still aren’t scoring a lot of points under Arthur Smith’s scheme, it feels like this offense has more to give that we haven’t seen yet, as opposed to thinking it has nothing to give at all as we all sensed under Matt Canada.

“We have the right guys in the locker room,” tight end Pat Freiermuth said. “We have a lot of guys who complement each other in certain areas. These next two games before the bye week, we are in control of how we finish it.”

At this point in 2023, we were starting to feel shaky about starting QB Kenny Pickett, and no one had any faith in backup Mitch Trubisky.

Right now, the Steelers are making a quarterback change. At least the goal appears to be hunting for more productivity with an improved product under Russell Wilson, even after Justin Fields did better than many expected.

That’s in stark contrast to merely hoping to avoid frequent failure as we so often saw through six weeks of 2023.

However, the receivers are worse this year. The offensive line is decimated by injuries, unlike the completely healthy unit of a year ago. Plus, prior to last week, Fields was the best part of the run attack.

So the verdict on offense is, “Yes … a little.” But not as much as we may be assuming. Let’s see what we are saying after Wilson’s debut Sunday.

Defensively

The results have been almost identical on defense. Coordinator Teryl Austin sees tangible improvement, though.

“I like our team speed. I think we’ve improved that,” Austin said. “We’ve added some good veteran additions, which have helped us. More importantly, I like the jell where we are right now as compared to last year.”

The 2024 group has been strong in all four wins — just 9.75 points allowed per victory. It was pretty lousy in the two losses to the Dallas Cowboys and Indianapolis Colts with 47 points and 803 yards allowed.

Similarly, last year’s group was only yielding 16.75 points per game in the four wins, and scoring points too. Yet it was rotten in the two losses against San Francisco and Houston, allowing 30 points in both defeats.

A few areas where the Steelers are clearly better on defense this year are at the cornerback position opposite Joey Porter Jr. (because of Donte Jackson), inside linebacker depth, and the return of a healthy Cameron Heyward.

“Cam is playing lights-out,” Austin said. “He is a unicorn. For a big guy to play as good as he is playing inside — at his age — is outstanding.”

Outside linebacker has gotten thin quickly. But the looming return of Alex Highsmith will remedy that.

I’ll agree with Austin here. For as impactful as the defense was early last season, it’s been roughly equivalent to that this year, and there is reason to believe it might be more sustainable in the second half of 2024.

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Special teams

These are no doubt better. Corliss Waitman has been a far more reliable punter than Pressley Harvin, even though he was the second option after the injured Cameron Johnston.

Chris Boswell is the same. That’s a good thing. He was 19 of 19 on place kicks through six games last year. He is 26 of 27 this year.

After Jeremiah Moon’s punt block last week in Vegas, it’s apparent that Danny Smith’s group is still a threat in that regard.

As far as the return game goes? Eh, it’s the NFL. They have made it immaterial, so let’s leave it at that.

The schedule

This is a variable that works against the Steelers. By now in 2023, the Steelers already had two AFC North wins in their back pocket. That was big. For as bad as things looked in many ways through those six games, two of them were victories over the Browns and Ravens.

Thus far in 2024, the Steelers have yet to touch divisional play. In fact one of the Steelers four wins so far is against NFC teams. That doesn’t mean as much on the tie-breaker level for playoff positions which always seems to be a huge factor for the Steelers.

Furthermore, Pittsburgh still has to deal with a Thursday game in Cleveland and the Wednesday Christmas game against the Kansas City Chiefs. There is also a five-game stretch with four on the road between Nov. 21 and Dec. 21.

At least they have a bye in two weeks at the halfway point, which is a better break than getting it five weeks in, as they had a season ago. Also, the Browns and Bengals are a combined 3-9.

All in all

Are the Steelers in a better spot than they were at this same time a season ago? Yeah. They probably are.

Not as much as the fanboys on social media and the mouthpiece plants the team has in the mainstream media. But probably so.

At least they aren’t chanting “FI-RE ARTH-UR” yet at Penguins games. However, if Steelers fans start chanting “Be-NCH Tris-TAN’ at Acrisure Stadium, I won’t blame them.