Week 2 - Seahawks @ Steelers - Pregame Thoughts
Week two. Home opener in Pittsburgh. Life’s great innit?
The Seattle Seahawks are taking the long trip to Pittsburgh for a 1 pm (EST) matchup against the Steelers, tomorrow. The Steelers are coming off a solid win in New Jersey, but the defense left a lot to be desired, and they’ll be looking to get right against a Seattle offense that struggled last week in a loss against the 49ers.
On the injury front, the Seahawks will be without S Nick Emmanwori, who’s out with an ankle injury, and likely CB Devon Witherspoon who’s doubtful with a knee injury. Assuming he doesn’t play, Witherspoon is a TOUGH loss for them. S Julian Love has been nursing a groin injury all week, but it looks like he will play. For the Steelers, we are dealing with several tough losses. Obviously, Derrick Harmon will remain out with his knee injury. We will also be without CB Joey Porter Jr., who didn’t practice all week and is out with a hamstring, and S DeShon Elliot, who also missed practice all week and is out with a knee. The Steelers signed S Jabrill Peppers, who seems poised to start in Elliot’s place in the meantime. That’s a big time addition to this defense with or without the injury to Elliot; the injury just speeds up his timeline to see the field in my opinion. The loss of JPJ sucks ass for sure, but the Seahawks WR room is top-heavy as hell: Jaxon Smith-Njigba saw 13 targets come his way last week, while their number two receiver, Cooper Kupp, only saw 3 targets. In a perfect world, we’ll slot Jalen Ramsey against JSN most of the game, and let the rest of the matchups sort themselves out. Assuming that’s the route we go, I have faith in Brandin Echols, Darius Slay, and James Pierre to carry out the gameplan from there.
That Seahawks defense has some dawgs on it that should have our attention, for sure. Byron Murphy II, Ernest Jones IV, DeMarcus Lawrence, and Boye Mafe are the names that immediately stand out to me. Last week, Boye generated four pressures on 11 pass rushes against ‘9ers LT Trent Williams. He aligned on that right side (left side of the o-line) on 61.5% of his snaps (via NFL Pro), which matches him up with Broderick Jones often, assuming that trend continues. After a solid performance against one of the league’s best, I just hope Jones is able to hold up. It’s worth noting that Jones didn’t lose as often as it felt like he did last week; it’s just that the losses were really, really ugly ones. This defense can absolutely get after the QB, so it’ll be a real test for our young offensive line.
If we’re able to keep Aaron Rodgers upright, then good things could continue to happen for this offense. Brock Purdy went for 200+ passing yards, JSN went for 100+ receiving yards, and Christian McCafferey went for 70+ receiving yards, though he was held under 3.5 yards per carry. That really plays into what the Steelers offense did against the Jets very well, though I think Steelers fans might lose their collective minds if we have to sit through another game averaging just a few yards per carry. I figure if we score 30+ and win again, then that probably doesn’t matter a ton, right? laughs nervously
Like I said earlier, this could be a get-right game for our defense. Obviously, we had an atrocious game defending the run last week, but Sam Darnold is not the mobile QB that Justin Fields is, so at least their gameplan can be more contained in that regard. Kenneth Walker III and Zach Charbonnet combined for 67 yards on 22 carries (about 3.0 yards per carry) ; we should be able to keep them contained if we play the way our defensive front is expected to play. But, we expected that last week too, and I was wildly disappointed, so we shall see. Beyond that, I’m going to pop some popcorn and enjoy Jalen Ramsey vs. Jaxon Smith-Njigba.
When it comes to the Seattle Seahawks, I feel about them how I felt about the New York Jets last week. That is: I think we are the better team by a fairly wide margin, but there are a lot of variables that I think could keep this game close. To me, the biggest one is the Steelers offensive line vs. the Seahawks defensive line. We expected a low scoring game last week and got a barnburner, but I’m again going to predict a relatively low scoring game. I’m just not sure I have a ton of confidence in either offense coming into this game, but I have a lot more confidence in ours than I do theirs, so give me the Steelers by a touchdown. 2-0 incoming.
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