Tim Benz: Steelers flipped the script vs. Miami. Now it's time for a new ending

The Pittsburgh Steelers (8-6) reversed the current in a number of ways against the Miami Dolphins (6-8) on Monday night.

What has been bad has gotten a lot better. And it’s getting good at the right time.

Consider some of the negative trends that were disrupted during the club’s 28-15 win over Miami.

Getting off the field and staying on the field

The Steelers defense is 27th in the NFL in allowing third-down conversions at 42.42%. Yet they were successful at stopping the Dolphins 6-of-8 times Monday night.

The Steelers also out-snapped the Dolphins 62-48. Coming into Week 15, the Steelers were last in the NFL in play differential at minus-187. That was the worst in the league by 100 snaps.

The team is also last in the NFL when it comes to time of possession at 27 minutes, 26 seconds per game.

But they had a 33:33 effort against the Dolphins.

“Art (Smith) got into a really good rhythm,” quarterback Aaron Rodgers said of his offensive coordinator. “I felt like he was really good situationally with the calls. Then we converted three fourth downs. The big stat that’s been killing us a lot of the season is the time of possession, and today we had (33:33). Up by six (minutes) and change in that department, which was really important.”

Coming out of halftime

The Steelers blew second-half leads against Seattle, Green Bay, Chicago and Buffalo this season.

Last week, even though the defense struggled against Baltimore after halftime, the offense scored on its first two possessions in the third quarter.

Monday night, the Steelers were excellent in the third quarter, holding the ball for 11 of the 15 minutes. They posted two touchdowns and 163 yards and forced the Dolphins to minus-20 yards from scrimmage.

“(We’ve) been moving in the right direction of late,” head coach Mike Tomlin said Tuesday. “Sometimes solutions come to you in an instant, and you see the fruit of that instantly. Sometimes your will and commitment get tested because you don’t necessarily get what you’re looking for immediately. We haven’t done anything significantly different in the last two weeks in that area that we hadn’t been working on.”

Even though Miami posted two late garbage-time touchdowns, the Steelers still outscored the Dolphins 21-12 in the second half of play.

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Using the middle of the field

In terms of passing-target location, the Steelers use the middle of the field 19% of the time. That’s 21st in the NFL.

On Monday night, though, according to Next Gen Stats, Rodgers finished 17 of 18 for 173 yards — and his two touchdowns — on passes between the numbers.

Aaron Rodgers finished 17 for 18 for 173 yards and both of his touchdowns on passes between the numbers in Week 15.

His 94.4% completion percentage on such passes was his highest in a game since Week 14, 2016.

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— Next Gen Stats (@NextGenStats) December 16, 2025

Furthermore, all three of Rodgers’ completions over 10 air yards Monday night were between the numbers. On downfield passes, Rodgers has averaged 16.7 yards per attempt over his last two games.

That’s in stark contrast to the way things had been tracking for him. The QB’s average had been at 3.4 over his previous five games.

“They were playing a bunch of shell. They came in and had a certain amount of pressure percentage that they played, and we expected them to play maybe a little more one-high,” Rodgers said. “It was a lot of shell. We had to be efficient, dink and dunk at times and kind of take what was there.”

Stopping the run

A Steelers rush defense that had averaged 157 yards allowed over the past five weeks held a red-hot Miami rush attack to just 63 yards on the ground. The Dolphins put up 192 yards per contest during what had been a four-game win streak.

“I thought we were able to limit (the run) as much as possible. Got off the field early in some instances. I thought our tackling was a lot better,” defensive lineman Cam Heyward said. “Patrick Queen on a third down late in the second half, really shooting the gap. I just thought a lot of guys played downhill from there.”

Not to mention, the Steelers had to play without T.J. Watt and Derrick Harmon in the front seven.

“I think it was just knowing how they work running the ball and how bad we’ve been at run defense. Something had to give. We didn’t want it to be us,” Queen said. “Everybody was playing confident, playing solid football, trusting the man next to you to do their job. When the play comes to you, make the play.”

The rush defense needs to be sharp again this week against the Detroit Lions. They average 131 yards per contest, fifth best in the NFL.

Winning without Watt

Since Watt was drafted in 2017, the Steelers took the field 11 times without him and were 1-10 in those contests.

That was before the club played without him and won against the Dolphins.

“Obviously, we miss T.J., but (we) had other guys step up,” Heyward said. “In the past, we haven’t really had Alex (Highsmith), Nick (Herbig) and Jack (Sawyer) to kind of make up that collective. But it’s not a one-man defense. We’ve all got to thrive. We all got to play our best ball in December. The way I look at it is we bought a week off for T.J.”

If that week off is being purchased this Sunday, that’s a shame because the Steelers are facing a Detroit club that has already racked up a league-high 428 points.

None of this is to suggest these problems are fixed. It’s only to point out that Tomlin, his staff and his players addressed them for at least one week.

“If you believe in the agenda, you keep pounding away. It might just be that we are finally breaking through some areas that are producing the outcomes,” Tomlin said. “We might have been in the right neighborhood, knocking on the right doors for an extended period of time. That’s the challenge of decision-making and strategy in this business.”

The Steelers may be flipping the script on a number of notable scenes from earlier in their 2025-26 season. Let’s see what chapter is written as the team buses pull away from Ford Field on Sunday evening.