Tim Benz: Broderick Jones’ 4-letter description of loss to Seahawks — and why he’s right
Pittsburgh Steelers offensive tackle Broderick Jones summed up his club’s 31-17 loss to the Seattle Seahawks on Sunday.
“That game was like a (expletive) show, basically, for us,” Jones said Monday afternoon.
Yup. That’s a pretty accurate description of the 2025 Acrisure Stadium season opener.
We can come up with a thousand different topics after any NFL game. But why bother with the other 998 points of discussion? To underscore Jones’ assessment, that game boiled down to two thoughts.
• Everything that was bad in Week 1 against the New York Jets stayed bad in Week 2 against Seattle.
• The one thing that was good in Week 1, the offensive passing game, got worse in Week 2.
There you have it. That’s all the analysis you need from a Pittsburgh perspective on Steelers-Seahawks on Sunday.
In Seattle, I imagine the discussion has been more nuanced after they bounced back from a bland 17-13 loss to San Francisco in Week 1.
It doesn’t have to be here. Those two bullet points tell the whole story of what happened against the Seahawks.
If you think my two overarching thesis statements are wrong, tell me where.
The defense was still bad. It gave up 31 points and 395 yards this week. It yielded 32 points and 394 yards last week in New York.
Seattle’s primary receiver, Jaxon Smith-Njigba, put up eight catches and 103 yards this week. New York’s main target, Garrett Wilson, had seven receptions for 95 yards and a touchdown last week.
Seattle’s top running back, Kenneth Walker III, went off for 118 total yards from scrimmage and a touchdown. The Jets’ lead back, Breece Hall, had 145 yards from scrimmage. As a team, Seattle posted 117 yards rushing after the Jets put up 182.
Seahawks quarterback Sam Darnold had 295 yards passing and two touchdowns. Between passing and running, Jets QB Justin Fields accounted for 266 yards and three total touchdowns.
“We’ve got to play sound defense. We’ve got to play disciplined. It starts up front,” linebacker Nick Herbig said. “That’s on our room. We’ve got to be better.”
Meanwhile, on offense, the Steelers only netted 72 yards rushing against Seattle, after putting up a putrid 53 at MetLife Stadium. And the offensive line, responsible for the run blocking issues, was also responsible for letting Aaron Rodgers get pressured 11 times, sacked three times and hit an additional five.
On the road in Week 1, Rodgers was sacked four times and hit eight times.
“When you keep the defense on its heels, it helps us as well,” Jones said of the line’s need to establish the run to set up the pass. “Because they never know. In today’s day and age, there are a lot of trick plays out there. Reverse sweeps, jet motions. A lot of moving pieces in a lot of different offenses.”
Rodgers’ individual numbers dipped from 244 yards passing with four touchdowns and no interceptions, to 203 yards with one touchdown and two interceptions. That equates to a passer rating of 58 as opposed to 136.7 last week.
Rodgers’ wide receivers didn’t help much. Sixty-five of Rodgers’ yards came on one completion to running back Jaylen Warren.
Jaylen Warren went crazy on this catch and run ????
SEAvsPIT on FOX/FOX Onehttps://t.co/HkKw7uXVnt pic.twitter.com/fKSeR78pKg
— NFL (@NFL) September 14, 2025
Tight ends Pat Freiermuth, Connor Heyward and Jonnu Smith accounted for eight catches and 64 yards (plus a two-point conversion to Darnell Washington).
But the receivers were basically no-shows. DK Metcalf dipped from 83 yards receiving to 20. He also dropped two passes again.
Calvin Austin had only one catch for 22 yards after a 70-yard day (with a touchdown) in the opener. He also tried to dive for a ball in the end zone that cut off a potential catch by Freiermuth that resulted in an interception.
Roman Wilson only caught one pass while Ben Skowronek and Scotty Miller were shut out. All that against a Seattle secondary that was playing with a banged-up Julian Love, and without cornerback Devon Witherspoon and safety Nick Emmanwori.
Not to mention cornerback Riq Woolen, who had struggled mightily in San Francisco last week.
You can even say the special teams got worse because of Kaleb Johnson’s huge miscue on that fourth quarter kickoff that gave Seattle a touchdown, after a forced fumble on special teams the previous week from Kenneth Gainwell essentially won the game in New York.
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So, I ask again, what got better?
Warren, because of his one big play? OK. I’ll give you that. Yet, he still only rushed for 20 yards on five carries. That’s not the production you want from your lead running back.
“We are going to look at the film and see what we can come up with as a group,” Warren said. “Week 2, we’ve got a lot to learn from. Come out Week 3 and perform.”
Chris Boswell was good, but he’s always good — and he wasn’t asked to bang home a pair of kicks beyond 55 yards this week.
And, to reiterate, how can one refute the argument that the passing game regressed?
You can’t. Just like we can no longer believe that one attribute of the team alone will be able to overcome the rest of its shortcomings until those areas round into shape.
Even though the Steelers are 1-1 after two weeks, it feels like a (bleep) show.
Tim Benz is a Tribune-Review staff writer. You can contact Tim at tbenz@triblive.com or via X. All tweets could be reposted. All emails are subject to publication unless specified otherwise.
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