The Pittsburgh Steelers’ offense is at its best when the run game is working. The Steelers found it hard to do that at the beginning of the year, but the ground game has slowly improved as the year has progressed. That’s thanks to the efforts of Jaylen Warren, Kenneth Gainwell, and the offensive line.
However, Ben Roethlisberger still thinks they aren’t running the ball often enough, especially near the goal line.
“I also wonder why we got into the red zone so much, and Jaylen Warren can get us like three yards, all the time. Why are we not handing him the ball a lot on the goal line?” Roethlisberger said on his Footbahlin podcast this week. “You got down to the two or three-yard line a couple times. Why is Warren not getting the ball three or four times?”
The Steelers are already highly successful in the red zone, but Roethlisberger isn’t wrong that Warren hasn’t gotten a ton of touches near the goal line. For one, the Steelers like to throw the ball down there. Aaron Rodgers has thrown 17 touchdowns, many of which have come in the red zone. Just last week against the Colts, he threw a red zone touchdown to Pat Freiermuth. And in the first quarter, the Steelers threw on both third- and fourth-and-short in the red zone.
Coming into Sunday’s game, Jaylen Warren had no rushing touchdowns.
However, that changed in a big way. Warren got some chances against the Colts and took advantage of them. In the second quarter, he scraped over the goal line to give the Steelers their first touchdown of the day. Early in the fourth quarter, some good blocking helped him find the end zone again.
However, even with big leads like the one they had on Sunday, Roethlisberger still doesn’t think the Steelers are running the ball enough.
“That’s the Steelers’ way, is running the clock out,” Roethlisberger said. “They’re [defense] not even coming back out on the field. And so, it was interesting to see us throw the ball so much late. For whatever reason, if they think they couldn’t run the ball or what, at the end of the game, when you’re just beating guys down, the linemen love it, the other team feels demoralized by it.”
The Steelers were up 24-10 halfway through the fourth quarter. They ran Warren once for a yard before punting. A couple of minutes later, they were up 27-10, and ran Gainwell once for a loss of nine, threw the ball three times, and kicked a field goal. The next drive after the Colts made it 27-17, they ran Warren once for seven yards, and Roman Wilson fumbled on the next play. Getting the ball back after a quick interception, Warren ran twice for a combined loss of a yard, and the Steelers punted.
So, Ben’s argument makes some sense. The Steelers had a two-possession lead from the 14:00 mark in the fourth quarter until the end of the game. And during those four drives, Warren ran the ball a combined four times for seven yards.
Credit to the Steelers for trying to use Warren to grind out the clock on that last drive. However, they’ve got to get him the ball more. Leading by 17 in the fourth quarter, no drive should have three passes and one run, especially when the one run play doesn’t even go to the starting running back. And a lack of run plays late in games has been a common theme.
All that said, the run game has shown plenty of bright spots in certain weeks. And it’s also not a bad idea to trust Aaron Rodgers’ arm. However, the Steelers probably could run the ball a little more, especially with the lead.
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