Reading The Defense Week 4

The Steel Curtain and the Purple People Eaters are museum pieces. Those defenses were built for a game that let them play meaner, and the league has spent the years since legislating that version of the sport out of existence. The fear that comes with facing a good defense now lives more in the call sheet than in the physicality. That does not mean the front no longer decides games. The lunch-pail, missing-tooth defenses are gone. The problem of lining up against a defensive line that wins the point of attack is not. Pittsburgh is a useful reminder. The nuance in how the Steelers build and deploy that front is still worth reading, because the bet up front has not changed even if the rules around it have.

Behind The New Steel Curtain

Start with the front. That has been the bet in Pittsburgh for the better part of three decades, and it is still the bet. T.J. Watt is the anchor, and Thursday night reminded everyone he is one of the hardest edges in the league to account for. Through four games, the raw line is what you would expect from him: 13 total tackles, 4.5 sacks, a pick-six against Atlanta, and the forced fumble on Deshaun Watson that tied Greg Lloyd for the franchise record. He is an all-timer. That part is not the edge. The edge is what Patrick Graham is asking the rest of the front office to do in his first year as coordinator. The Steelers are still a 3-4 in name, and the zone-blitz identity goes back to the Cowher and LeBeau years, when the extra rusher was the norm. Graham has moved the menu. He will show seven at the line, then drop out of it. Simulated pressures leave the rush with four and put seven in coverage.

Week 1, he barely blitzed at all, then told reporters the blitz was coming when the game called for it. The call sheet is multiple. The plan is not. The plan is to manufacture one-on-ones. Graham has said he is not chasing a free runner. He wants the offensive line blocked into the matchups his front can win. That is Watt on one edge, Alex Highsmith on the other, Nick Herbig in the rotation, and Cameron Heyward still owning the interior at 37. Through three games, throwing out Thursday because Pittsburgh is one of two teams that have played four, Watt had 3.5 sacks and Highsmith had 3.0. Herbig and Heyward are still looking for their first. The production is concentrated. The structure around it is the tell. On plays where Pittsburgh does not blitz, the pressure rate is 34.3%, front half of the league. That is the old Steelers idea in a new wrapper. The disguise creates the look. The players have to finish it.

A Defensive DawgPound