Rookie Chase Claypool scores 4 TDs as Steelers beat Eagles, move to 4-0

With an unexpected bye dropped into the fourth week of the NFL season, the Pittsburgh Steelers could be excused for wondering whether their offense would be rustier than a 20-year-old SUV on Sunday against the Philadelphia Eagles.

Those concerns were unfounded. At least for quarterback Ben Roethlisberger. And certainly for rookie wide receiver Chase Claypool.

Thanks to a record-setting performance from Claypool, who caught three touchdown passes from Roethlisberger and ran a sweep for a fourth score, the Steelers turned in their best offensive showing since 2018 with a 38-29 victory at Heinz Field.

By eclipsing the 30-point barrier for the first time in 24 games, the Steelers also improved to 4-0 for the first time since 1979. At this point last year, without Roethlisberger after Week 2, the Steelers were 1-4 after an 0-3 start.

“It’s always important to kind of get out early because you don’t know what the season holds, right?” Roethlisberger said. “We’ve played a lot of home games. Obviously, that helps. But there’s still a lot of football ahead of us.”

The next stretch includes games against Cleveland, Tennessee and Baltimore, a trio that has a combined 11-2 record. The combined record of the four teams the Steelers have beaten is 3-15-1.

The last time the Steelers scored 30 points in a game was Dec. 2, 2018, a 33-30 loss to the Los Angeles Chargers. They were the only NFL team not to score 30 points in a game last season, and they gave glimpses of what would transpire Sunday by scoring 26, 26 and 28 points in the first three weeks.

Then came that unscheduled layoff after a rash of Tennessee Titans players tested positive for covid-19.

“You don’t really know (what to expect), right?” Roethlisberger said. “You talk about just trying to get back in the flow of things. We talked about it early in the week, but once the week gets going, you’ve got to just go and play ball.”

After punting on their opening drive, the Steelers scored on their next five possessions to take a 31-14 lead less than five minutes into the third quarter. But the Eagles, who were practically unstoppable on third down, came back to within 31-29 in the fourth quarter and were a missed 57-yard field-goal attempt away from taking a lead.

Travis Fulgham, who was waived twice in training camp before finding a spot on the Eagles roster, caught 10 passes for 152 yards and a touchdown.

“It wasn’t a perfect performance by any stretch,” coach Mike Tomlin said. “We’re not looking to be perfect. We’re looking to be good enough to win.”

The Steelers salted away the victory after Jake Elliott’s missed field-goal attempt gave them the ball back at their 47 with 3 minutes, 18 seconds remaining. It took all of 19 seconds for Roethlisberger and Claypool to hook up for a third time, a 35-yard touchdown that put the rookie second-round pick into the history books.

The four touchdowns for Claypool made him only the third rookie in NFL history to accomplish the feat, joining Jerry Butler (1979) and Harlon Hill (1954). He became the first Steelers player with a four-touchdown game since Roy Jefferson in 1968.

“Something like this, you can never predict,” Claypool said. “But you always go into the game thinking that you’re going to have a really big day, and you kind of have to keep that mindset throughout the season, but I would never have predicted this outcome.”

Roethlisberger completed 27 of 34 passes for 239 yards. He also was sacked just once by the Eagles, who entered the game with an NFL-high 17. Roethlisberger’s 125.4 passer rating was a season high, and he has thrown 10 touchdown passes versus one interception in helping the Steelers to their best start in 41 years.

“I’m still missing the deep ball too much, still overthrowing,” said Roethlisberger, who averaged 8.5 yards per completion and 7.0 yards per attempt. “I know last week I talked about it and said I’d rather overthrow it than underthrow it. But I’ve got to figure it out.”

Claypool, of course, made his quarterback’s job easier.

Accounting for the Steelers’ first three touchdowns, Claypool had scoring grabs of 32 and 5 yards, and he found the end zone on a 2-yard run off a jet sweep. He finished with seven catches for 110 yards, and he carried three times on sweeps for 6 yards. He also had a catch on a deep ball down the sideline overturned on a replay review and had another touchdown reception negated by offensive pass interference.

Ray-Ray McCloud, playing extensively because of a first-quarter back injury to Diontae Johnson, had a 58-yard run on a reverse and totaled 63 yards on two carries. He also caught three passes for 12 yards.

The Steelers also broke out a four-man bunch formation that resulted in Claypool’s 5-yard touchdown catch and run on the opening drive of the third quarter.

“We’re just trying to move the ball around and make everybody defend the entire field both vertically and horizontally,” Tomlin said. “That’s just a component of our attack. We brought it to the stage today. That’s why we strive to be diverse, to keep people off balance, to be able to go to personalities and utilize those personalities to win football games.”

So far, so good.