Can Mike McCarthy revive the Steelers offensively and make them formidable on the scoreboard? Ray Fittipaldo believes so. But it’s far from a guarantee, he admits, even if the potential is there. With the changes made this offseason, he is at least confident in an improvement from 2025.
“I definitely think it profiles to be better than last year”, he said of the Steelers’ first offense under McCarthy while appearing on 93.7 The Fan. As to whether or not they will actually be good, that is a little more complicated. It’s easy to be better than a mediocre offense.
“Good, you would probably have to be, what, top 15 in yards, top 15 in points scored. You have to be the reason your team is in the hunt for the playoffs”, Fittipaldo said, laying out some benchmarks he believes McCarthy’s Steelers offense will have to hit. “I think they could get there, but I also think this defense has a chance to be better, too, so I don’t want to oversell the offense.
“I do think in the end, if McCarthy gets them to be top 15 in yards, top 12 in points, if they could do that, they do have a chance to get up to around maybe 26-27 points per game. I think if they do that, fans should be thrilled”.
The last time the Steelers averaged 26 points in a season was the fluky 2020 COVID-19 year, and the offense also got some help from three defensive touchdowns. That season, Ben Roethlisberger tossed 33 touchdown passes and the team ran for 12 scores. Including two from a rookie Chase Claypool because nothing was normal about the year 2020.
Of course, most of what followed has been the nadir of the Steelers offense. Even in Roethlisberger’s final season in 2021, scoring dropped to 20.2 points per game. They got less help, but that hardly makes up for the difference. But the Steelers scored 23.4 points per game last season with Aaron Rodgers at quarterback. Can Mike McCarthy and the changes he’s made add a field goal per game this season?
For what it’s worth, Mike McCarthy has had a top-five scoring offense for half of his career as a head coach, and he managed that both in Dallas and in Green Bay, so it’s not so far-fetched that he could do it with the Steelers as well. Granted, he had prime Aaron Rodgers and Dak Prescott for those seasons, so that’s a pretty monumental caveat.
As recently as 2023, McCarthy’s second-to-last season as a head coach, the Cowboys led the league in scoring and finished fifth in yardage. Dak Prescott had a league-high 36 touchdown passes, while the offense rushed for 14 scores. That translated to 29.9 points per game, a higher mark than the Steelers’ offense has ever achieved. But the Cowboys had a stunning seven non-offensive touchdowns that year, too. CB DaRon Bland had five pick-sixes, while they also had a fumble and blocked field goal returned for scores. The Steelers’ offense sure could use that, too.