Pittsburgh Steelers vs. Cincinnati Bengals Preview & Prediction | PFF

Pittsburgh Steelers vs. Cincinnati Bengals Preview & Prediction | PFF

This episode is sponsored by BetterHelp. October 10th is World Mental Health Day and this year we are saying thank you to therapists. BetterHelp therapists have helped over 5 million people worldwide on their mental health journeys. That’s millions of stories and millions of journeys. Behind each one of them is a therapist who showed up, listened, and helped someone take that next step forward. Moments in therapy like asking the right questions, having a safe place to get emotional or cry, or small wins that can change lives. This World Mental Health Day, BetterHelp is honoring those connections and the therapists who make them possible while showing how easy it is to get guidance from a licensed therapist online with BetterHel. I’ve been doing therapy for over two years and I couldn’t recommend it enough. It’s helped me so much with relationships with my friends, families, even myself. It’s helped me understand myself better and it’s just made for such a better life. It really has. With over 30,000 therapists, BetterHelp is the world’s largest online therapy platform, having served over 5 million people globally. And it works with an average rating of 4.9 out of five for live sessions based on over 1.7 million client reviews. This World Mental Health Day, we are collaborating with those therapists who have helped millions of people take a step forward. If you’re ready to find the right therapist for you, BetterHelp can help you start that journey. Our listeners get 10% off of their first month at betterhelp.com/pf. That’s betterhelp hp.com/pf. Let’s get into these games. Let’s talk about these games here. Thursday Night Football. Well, well, well. Look at that. Kicking it off with the Pittsburgh Steelers. Steelers at the uh the Cincinnati Bengals here on Thursday Night Football. Um it is ironically it feels like it feels like people say the most that we’re most biased against the Steelers and we’re most biased for the Cincinnati Bengals. So, of course, both of us are going to have the Cincinnati Bengals winning this game by a score of 70 to3. I mean, you might have a shut out 70 to zero, but we’ll see when we get into the uh the final scores here. But Dalton, in all seriousness, let’s talk about this game. Joe Flacco is now the starting quarterback for the Cincinnati Bengals. Obviously, it’s been tough for them on the offensive trenches, just offense overall really since Joe Burrow went down, but what do you think about this matchup here between these two teams? Where do you want to start talking about this one? Well, I think Joe Flacco coming into Cincinnati last week and after it took the first half for them really to get in a groove, he had the right idea when he dropped back to pass, right? and he had a relatively good passing grade last week. And I think the idea in this offense, especially with him being there for about a week now, so I mean, he’s made the adjustment pretty quick. Is one, get rid of the football quickly with this pass protection that he has that is pretty subpar. And you’re going against a great Steelers defensive line as we saw it dominate against Cleveland last week. So, a couple things stood out to me in this start. Number one, 2.35 second average time to throw. Yes, get rid of it. If the offensive line can’t protect you, protect yourself. Number two, 5.9 yardd average depth of target. That’s just going to be a fact of life when you get rid of the football that quickly allows some of your players, some of your receivers to make plays after the catch. And number three, look, this offense, the best part of this offense right now is one-on-one opportunities with Jamar Chase, with T. Higgins. 20 combined targets against Green Bay in last week’s game, the second most for those two this season. The only game where they had more was the team’s win over Jacksonville when those guys took advantage of that secondary on the outside. So the the idea here for Flacco is going to be the same. Look, TJ Watt, Nick Herbig, Alex Highmith, all those great pass rushers are coming at you and they’re coming at you quick. You’re going to have to get rid of the football. If you get man-to-man coverage, chuck it downfield and see if one of those two guys can win. If you get zone coverage, work underneath, keep drives alive, make positive plays. But I do at least think Joe Flacco has the right idea of getting rid of the football quickly and when it’s advantageous, get the ball to your two best players in Jamar Chase and T. Higgins. That’s the one way the Bengals can have success offensively in this game. Yeah, I I I think that it’s obviously going to be tough sledding for them because it is the best pass rush defensive line in the NFL. I know they don’t have the the most total pressures that belongs to the Denver Broncos, but uh boy, coming off of last week, it’s it is not great with this Bengals offensive line going up against what the Pittsburgh Steelers have with all of their diverse pass rushers and how they can get after uh Joe Flacco. So, it is going to be an interesting game on that side of the ball. I think for the Steelers specifically, I what I’m really looking at on their offensive side of the ball is throwing it 15 or more yards down the field because I think that’s really what’s going to tell the tale of I think the Steelers are going to win this game. But to me, it’s sort of a question of just by how much? And that will come down to is Rogers willing to push the ball deep down the field. When you look at their passing grade overall, the Steelers this season on passes of 15 or more yards, 61.7 overall passing PFF grade. It’s fine. You know, like we’ve said before here on this show, a 60 grade is about, you know, like it’s even, it’s replaceable. That’s it’s what you want it to be. So, not a ton of difference making passes 15 or more yards down the field. The Bengals 44.8 coverage grade on passes of 15 or more yards down the field. 18 receptions allowed of 15 or more yards. That’s the 12th most in the NFL. So, if we get into a situation where Rogers is going to be able to throw the ball deep down the field, I just don’t know if the Bengals have what they need to to be able to keep up with them in that regard. So, with the with how ferocious the Steelers are up front right now, just pinning their ears back, getting after the quarterback, going up against an offensive line in in uh in Cincinnati that is it’s been struggling this year to say the least. I’m taking the Steelers in this game 24 to 21. I think it’s going to be a little bit closer than maybe if the game was on Sunday. If the game was on Sunday, I feel like the Steelers margin of victory might be a little bit higher, but just Thursday night football, it’s it’s a little you never know what to expect really. And and it was one of those situations where we talked to um uh Terron Armstead last week and and we talked to him about Thursday Night Football specifically and he was like, “Look, on a shortened week, you basically condense the playbook down to a third and you say, “These are the things that we just do really well. You don’t really have a lot of time to scout the team that you’re going up against.” And I and I think that it’s just more of, hey, what do you do really well? And so I think it’s going to be a lot of Aaron Rogers instincts in this one, but I do think it’s going to be enough. I got the Steelers 24, the Bengals 21. What do you got, D? I I’ve got it 2116, a few less points in my result, but still Pittsburgh. I think when you talk about those constants, and I think the interesting part there for the game plan for the Bengals is, look, Flaco’s only been there a week anyway, so it’s an abbreviated version of the offense. But you look at what the Steelers, they they do two things well. They rush the passer at an elite level, and Aaron Rogers doesn’t turn the football over, right? It’s been shaky at times, been a couple of mistakes the first few weeks. He played his his best game this past week against Cleveland. I think he can do something similar in this game. And we don’t know if Trey Hendrickson is playing. And even if he is, Rogers can work around that. I think the Steelers do enough to get out of here with a win.

PFF’s Dalton Wasserman and Trevor Sikkema preview the matchup between The Pittsburgh Steelers and The Cincinnati Bengals.

Review Starts after BetterHelp ad:
0:00 – Intro
1:22 – Review Starts

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