So you're sayin' there's a chance? Steelers’ path to postseason rife with pitfalls

In a reverse take of the message ubiquitous on the rearview mirrors of cars, the Pittsburgh Steelers’ chances of making the playoffs are smaller than they appear.

When Week 14 of the NFL season wrapped up Monday night, the Steelers sat just a half-game out of sixth place in the AFC standings — the top seven qualify for the postseason — and a mere 1½ games out of the AFC North lead.

But despite that relative meager ground to make up over the 2021 season’s four-game homestretch, the math is far less kind to the Steelers’ chances of a second consecutive division title or playoff berth.

The New York Times, for example, pegs the Steelers’ chances of making the playoffs at roughly one-in-eight (13%). That’s down from 53% five weeks ago — the Steelers are amidst a 1-3-1 slide since. An eighth AFC North title under Mike Tomlin is more than twice as unlikely, according to The Times: The Steelers have a 6% chance at winning the division.

Given how close the Steelers are to a playoff position, why the long odds? For one thing, there’s a logjam in which half of the AFC’s teams (eight) have either six or seven wins. Navigating the group of Indianapolis Colts (7-6), Buffalo Bills (7-6), Cleveland Browns (7-6), Cincinnati Bengals (7-6), Denver Broncos (7-6), Las Vegas Raiders (6-7) and Miami Dolphins (6-7) won’t be easy under even the most ideal of circumstances. With only two of those eight able to claim a playoff spot, if only 25% of the group gets hot it leaves the Steelers little to no margin for error.

Another reason the New York Times computer doesn’t like the Steelers’ chances? It doesn’t think they’re very good.

By any reasonable calculation — old-school or new age — to make the playoffs the Steelers probably need to win (at least) three of their final four.

The Steelers have won only three games since Oct. 17.

Maybe that’s why ESPN’s model pegs the Steelers as 22nd-best of the NFL’s 32 teams. It is even less kind in calculating their playoff chances than the New York Times: ESPN says it’s about 1-in-10 for the Steelers to make the playoffs (10.3%) and 1-in-20 to claim the AFC North (4.9%).

The good news? It’s in their hands to do either. The path to passing the Browns, Bengals and Baltimore Ravens (8-5) in the division begins with beating Cleveland (in the home finale on “Monday Night Football” on Jan. 3) and Baltimore (on the road in the finale Jan. 9). The Steelers already beat each this season, and neither is playing its best football since mid-October.

But even two wins against their division rivals won’t be enough to get the Steelers into the playoffs. They’d need at least a win in one of their other two games — and both are versus division leaders (the Tennessee Titans at Heinz Field on Sunday and at the Kansas City Chiefs the day after Christmas).

With that remaining schedule — the third-toughest in the NFL, according to ESPN — the Steelers can take little solace the Browns (who play the NFC North-leading Green Bay Packers, Raiders and Bengals) and Ravens (who still face the 10-3 Packers, Bengals and playoff-caliber Los Angeles Rams) also have tough roads down the stretch.

Among the other teams the Steelers will have to overcome for a wild-card berth, the Bills have the second-easiest remaining schedule (per ESPN), the Chargers the seventh-easiest and the Dolphins the 11th-easiest. Among the seven teams the Steelers are most battling for one of three available playoff spots, none has a tougher remaining schedule than they do and only the Bengals (fifth-toughest), Raiders (sixth-toughest) and Broncos (10th-toughest) have a remaining schedule judged to be in the top half of the NFL in terms of its difficulty.

Not all hope is lost, though. ESPN gives the Steelers a 0.8% chance of making the AFC championship game, an 0.3% chance of making the Super Bowl … and a 0.1% chance of winning it all.

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