Like everyone else, Mark Madden of 105.9 The X isn’t thrilled with the Pittsburgh Steelers offense during their 1-2 start.
“Najee Harris looks clueless. Or hurt. Or both,” Madden said during this week’s “Madden Monday” podcast. “And the offensive play-calling is juvenile. Everything is to the sideline. There’s nothing in the middle. There is nothing deep. It’s scared. Whether Trubisky is scared, or Matt Canada is scared, I don’t know. But it’s scared. It’s cowardly.”
Through three weeks, the Steelers’ 272.7 yards per game on offense is the second-lowest total yards average in the NFL.
Madden didn’t want to dwell entirely on that side of the ball, though.
“Let’s not keep the defense blameless,” Madden continued. “If you lose one guy (T.J. Watt) and you stink and you can’t win, were you ever that close to elite in the first place?”
After being at the bottom of the NFL last year when it comes to stopping the run at 146.1 yards per game, the Steelers are still only 28th so far this year, yielding 142.7 yards per contest.
After sacking the Bengals seven times and forcing five turnovers with Watt on the field in Week 1, the Steelers have just one takeaway and two sacks the past two weeks.
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“It’s not very good,” Madden said of the Steelers defense. “But, then again, it wasn’t very good last year. We pretended it was elite. We just applied that label to it because of the big names. But that defense is making $100 million as a group. It’s got to do more than that.”
Madden said even one of their best, Cameron Heyward, appears to be struggling.
“This is the first time I’ve ever wondered how much is left in his tank,” Madden said of Heyward. “Alex Highsmith, to his credit, has the league lead in sacks with 4.5. But he’s not seeing the double teams. Cam Heyward is. And Heyward is invisible. I never thought I would say that about the guy. Well, I thought I would eventually. But not this soon. Not now.”
Heyward has 12 tackles over the past two weeks. But just one for loss and only one pass deflection. He has no sacks or QB hits in the last two games, while Watt has been injured.
Also on the podcast, Madden and I discuss the upcoming Steelers schedule, the notion of benching Mitch Trubisky, the Penguins preseason opener and a Pirates prediction about Andrew McCutchen.
