The Advanced ScoutWe got some work to do.
This is the Advanced Scout with Tom Opperman and Mack Williamson. Steel was coming off a big win against the Cincinnati Bengals in which the offense came to life, finally breaking that four hundred yard threshold. Arizona comes to town now for the first of two straight games at Akroshure Stadium. The Cardinals are limping in with a two to ten record after losing to the Los Angeles Rams and matt The Cardinals are zero and six this season on the road. They've lost those games by combined eighty points. They've lost their last two games by combined one hundred and fifteen points. I mean, this very may well be the worst team in the NFL.
Yeah, they're right to bottom the list. I mean many many of us thought that before the season started this was the front runner to get the first overall pick, and they probably won't quite achieve that lofty goal with the Patriots out there in Carolina and some other strugglers. But as you mentioned, they've been outscored by one hundred and fifteen points. They're terrible on the road. They don't win many games, but at least Kyler Murray's back.
Yeah, I guess that's a little silver lining for Cardinals fans. You can see what you got in your quarterback or if you need to move on, this is a stat that really jumps out to me, Matt. The Steelers and Cardinals ranked twenty third and twenty fourth, respectively on third down conversions this season, but the Steelers defense is fourteenth in that category getting off the field on third down one. Arizona is dead last, allowing forty seven percent of third down attempts to convert. Love hearing that, especially after the Steelers got their mojo going on those third down conversions, going eight for seventeen last week.
Yeah, great call. I mean, to be honest, I mean, just as an overview, the offense has some name players starting with Kyler Murray and is a little bit dangerous. You look at the defense though, and it's really lacking talent and they're playing some young guys. But I mean, their next couple offseasons are going to be to building that defense, and it really shows up on third downs without question.
Yeah, we'll get into the defense first in just a second, but as always set the table with some series history. This is a series that began in nineteen thirty three, with the Pittsburgh Pirates edging out the Chicago Cardinals fourteen to thirteen. Those versions of these franchises matched up five more times before Pittsburgh changed their name to the Steelers. The Chicago Cardinals became the Saint Louis Cardinals. Starting in nineteen sixty and nineteen eighty eight, the Steelers took on the Phoenix Cardinals. Since that Cardinals win, it has been the Pittsburgh Steelers Verse what we all know them.
Now the Arizona Cardinals.
Pittsburgh leads the all time series thirty five to twenty three to three, including a victory and Super Bowl forty three, one of the greatest Super Bowls ever played. Pittsburgh has a four game winning streak going and have won six of the last seven. Mike Tomlin is four and one against Arizona, a team that you don't see very often, but a team that the Steelers dominate when they do see them, especially recently. Yeah.
Again, it's not a very common opponent, of course, but they don't have a very storied history of winning their Super Bowls or even playoff appearances. No matter what city or you know where, they've they've shown up in over the years.
You know, looking at that Cardinals defense, which is pretty nameless, to be honest with you. I mean, Buddha Baker is probably the one that jumps out and people might recognize. But other than that, you'd be scratching your head to find somebody that's universally known. Four hundred and twenty one yards of total offense for the Steelers last week, Matt. The Cardinals give up a lot of yardage, but what I'm looking at is they give up the second most points per game in the NFL at twenty six point eight. Yardage was nice, but the next step in that Steelers offensive evolution is putting points up on the board, and the Cardinals certainly don't offer much resistance in that category.
No they don't. I mean, scanning the depth chart, people might remember Zaven Collins was, oh yeah.
That's a good goal. Yeah.
I mean he's still struggling though, to really find a footing in this league. You mentioned Baker, Buddha Baker, he's the leader on that side of the ball. They gave him money, but other than those two, it is definitely hard to find. And you're right, I mean, the Steelers now are do much better in plays run time of possession to air is that are not cardinal strikes as you can imagine. Third down now it needs to be red zone points, things of that nature, and we'll see. I mean, this is a good opponent to keep that rolling.
The Cardinals defense allows five point five yards per play, but five point seven yards per play over their last three games, and they surrendered six point nine yards per play against the Rams last week, four hundred and fifty seven total yards of offense put up by Los Angeles. Looking for just a calling card for this defense, and I had to look hard, Matt, but I guess they do about an average job of getting after the quarterback. They have two point seven sacks per game, that's right around league average, but there's no like Star doing it. They don't have anyone with more than five sacks this season, but there's thirteen different players that have recorded at least a sack this year, so they can at least put a little bit of pressure on your quarterback.
Yeah, and it's funny you said the word pressure. They're low in the league in terms of pressure rate, okay, but they're at least middle of the road. Give or take with sacks. But they don't have a sack master by any stretch. And as you said, it's been a group effort. It's not like, well, certainly you know Miles Garrett's coming to town. We got to stop him. I mean, it's hard to find a guy to single out that is their best sack guy.
You know, listening to coach Tomlins press today we record this on Tuesdays, he was talking about how that defense throws a lot of different looks at you throughout the game. But he, you know, in the way that Tomlin would say it, it was kind of couching just because they have to because there's just no one there.
There's no star, there's nothing to really build around.
And he mentioned that you might see a lot of five man fronts and it might be difficult to double team out of those five man fronts from the Cardinals defense. That shouldn't shy the Steelers away from anything as far as running the football. The Cardinals are very weak against the run. Just because they might put an extra guy up front. Don't shy away from riding. What's been giving you this nice couple of games offensively?
Yeah, well said, and they I mean their head coach was the defensive coordinator for the Eagles, and the Eagles are notorious, famous, whatever for their a five man fronts. But I don't see these aren't the same five different men. Yes, exactly.
Only the Commanders and Jaguars give up more second half points per game than Arizona, and over the past three games, the Cardinals are last in points allowed in the first half of games, but only the Giants and Patriots are producing fewer first half points than the Steelers this year again, hopefully a new lease on life for the Steelers offense, maybe they can spark some more points. But it is nice to see that they're bad in the second half Arizona's defense, because we know that's been Steeer's consistency all year long.
Yeah, they're pretty much bad everywhere. I don't know what to think of Steelers first half or second half. Now, I mean these I'm not ducking the subject, but as all our listeners know, I mean there's a new coordinator for Pittsburgh, so it's a little bit different to judge. You know, you can't just judge the one game. And Kyler Murray's only been here for three games for Arizona, so all I'm saying there's been recent wholesale changes to both offenses.
Looking at that Arizona offense which got wholesale change with Kyler Murray returning, Like you said, the average four point nine yards per play, but over the last three games they're averaging five point three. So there's a little uptick from Kyler Murray jumping into the lineup, but they're still getting outscored, like you mentioned in the past couple games by one hundred and fifteen points with their opponents. So Kyler Murray's an upgrade for sure, but he's not going to be Hercules lifting this entire team up on his.
Shoulders exactly exactly, and it's really an evaluation period for him. If they were to fall into the real early pick in the neighborhood of looking at quarterbacks, you know, do they want to go young and maybe trade Kyler. He's a big contract that they signed recently. He's coming off the injury, but you wouldn't notice it by the way he runs. He's still very active, agile, you know, flies around the field, and he's a high end talent. I mean, it's easy to forget that he was once the first overall pick of course he's small, but he gives them a chance for you know, for certain. I mean he is a dangerous, dangerous, talented football player.
Yeah, Arizona was throwing the ball a fifty eight point three percent of their offensive plays, which is about league average, but it's been up to sixty three point seven lately. I mean that's just you want to get the ball in your best player's hands as much as it possibly can. And speaking of someone shutting down the other team's best option in the passing game, Joey Porter Junior, I think deserves some flowers, Matt because of what he's done to DeAndre Hopkins, Amari Cooper and now Jamar Chase. I mean that box score is so deceiving. You know, those tip passes, he takes those for like fifty yards and two catches. He has a four catch eighty one yard day against Joey Porter Junior. Some might think there's really more like a two catch thirty yard day. Really impressive against the best receiver he's faced, granted, handcuffed receiver without his usual quarterback.
Yeah, one hundred percent. I didn't know if they would have him travel with Chase nearly as much as they did, which is a huge compliment to the rookie obviously.
Yeah, and something I think think, Matt, you'd like to see right like you were, well, yeah.
Yeah, I mean they have been a left right team. But if you get a special player in terms of their corner alignment, if you get a special player and you can get away with that against someone who's talented as Chase, that's an unbelievable compliment. Marquise Brown's the best guy obviously for sure on Arizona's passing game much different though, I mean he's very small, very fast. I mean, Porter's much bigger than him, much longer. I would think he travels again, but we'll see. It's funny. I got a tweet the other day from probably a Steeler fan, but and I hadn't thought of it in this light, but maybe people should start thinking it this way that and the tweet was, Hey, Matt, what's the difference between Porter's rookie season and Sauce Gardeners last year? With the exception of Porter took a couple of games till he really started taking over. And maybe that's the light we need to start thinking of this guy.
In Oh, you always hate to set those up high expectations like that. Yeah, seems to be unfair to some players, but you're right. I mean, week in and week out, if he's gonna have passer ratings against and you know, completion percentages against that he does and shut down these premier receivers in the league. Yeah, there's no reason that you can't think about it in that same light you mentioned Hollywood Brown. You don't know if he's this isn't a team that really warrants him to follow a specific person around. One person that Tomlin talked about a lot today though, was Rondell Moore and just how creative they will use him, not bringing him up saying well, Joey Porting is gonna go take him on one on one, different kind of receiver and more, they're gonna hand him the ball off a lot. They're gonna do a lot of interesting things with him. Is he someone that you look at that could be a potential game breaker and again we're stretching really hard to find potential game breakers for this team.
Yeah. I like the player extremely fast. He's also very small, and.
He is some small receiver.
Rather Yeah, I mean that's the thing is that they are undersized, but they have speed they'll hand him the ball behind the line of scrimmage, you'll give a bubble screen. You know, he is scary with the ball in his hands, but he's not a traditional route runner. You know, Brown does more of that stuff. Wilson's another young guy. He missed last week as a good young receiver. But all in all, it's a good group. It's a fast group, but it's not a big physical group, that's for sure.
Trey McBride and the tight end spot became a full time starter in Week eight and since then he's averaging six receptions seventy yards per game. He now has twenty five targets from Kyler Murray in those three games. He's definitely become a threat in someone that Kyler Murray has favored in the offense.
I'm a big trade Brook McBride fan, and he's come on like gangbusters, really like. So that's something that Arizona should really be excited about. In my opinion. He was. It wasn't a first round tight end drafted a year ago, but he was the first tight end off the board in the second round. And even when zach Ertz come back comes back, I think that McBride will be a feature player for them, and he's pretty enticing, I mean a good young time.
Yeah, no doubt.
And then what about our old friend James Connor, local kid coming back home to Agroscurer Stadium. Just twenty seven yards on the ground last week, but he's pretty much the same running back that we remember here. Has been a little bit more lucky in the injury department since moving to Arizona's been able to play a little bit more, but physical runner. If he gets to the second level, he can do a lot of damage and he has the nose for the goal line.
Yeah. Maybe he's even had a better career in Arizona than he did here. And he was a quality stealer as we know, catches the ball well, tough coming off an injury though this past week he wasn't featured as he had been in the past. I mean, he has a very large rushing share basically through his career with Arizona, they give him the ball a lot and don't really decide, you know, get away from him. But last week it was kind of a group effort. They picked up Michael Carter from the Jets and he's kind of an interesting third bound back. They have too.
Offensive line. They were a team that took a tackle this year.
Matt in this loaded tackle class, twenty third pick in the first round, with Paris Johnson Junior at right tackle, how's the line hold up in general?
And how's he been playing as a rookie.
He's good. I think he's going to be a franchise type offensive tackle for them that they expected. Humphreys is the other tackle. He's been a pretty good player for them as well. The interiors weaker, you know, I mean Will Hernandez, fro Hold, Tristan Cologne certainly not household names. I think that you know, Kyler's going to be under a lot of interior pressure. I'd be shocked if they have much success moving Cam Hayward Bent and Ogan Job off the spot in the run game as well.
Before we get to our key matchups here, Matt in the game, one little hat tip I want to give to the Steelers defense. In their past five games, they've given up just or excuse me, past seven games they're allowing just fifteen points per game, and if you look right now, they are fifth in the NFL as far as scoring defense is concerned. That is an elite statistic for this defense absolutely is.
I mean, what they've been doing the last almost two months, give or take, has been really really good. It's not like they've been playing weak opponents. I know there's some backup quarterbacks in there as well, but that long of a stretch, this defense is really coming around, and you would hope, and it seems quite possible that Mike Fitzpatrick will be in the mix this week.
Yeah, we can only hope. So it's long overdue for him to return in the lineup, all right. Looking at our key matchups and Cardinals and Steelers, the first one Arizona quarterback Kyler Murray versus Steelers linebacker Landon Roberts, Alanda Robertson, even Mika Walker in the past week have looked decent in replacing Holcomb and Kwan. Alexander Roberts was a part of that trio to begin with too, but he's really stepped up and now he's definitely going to have his hands full with a mobile quarterback, the most mobile quarterback of Steelers will see other than Lamar Jackson.
Yeah, one hundred percent. And I think Roberts has played extremely well when he's been thrust into eight every snap role, which is exactly what he did this past week. Never came off the field once downhill. Thumper has been great against the run, especially the inside run stuff. Now I wonder, you know, will his average foot speed translate well with Murray in the open field. Probably not. I mean, that's gonna be a problem for him. You're not gonna want him spying Murray. But it is an interesting setup as well as guarding McBride in the middle of the field too.
And our final matchup Steels offensive tackles versus Cardinals edge. Dennis gar Deck not a household name, man, I like you going with a deep for the folks at home.
Yeah, efficient, I mean he doesn't play every snap. He plays really hard. He's a good player that no one knows about. Seems to get key sacks for them. I think he's their best pass rusher. But I'll be honest, it wasn't easy to grab a Cardinal's name to highlight here.
Yeah, no doubt that defense is pretty nameless. And again, second most points per game allowed in the NFL yielded by that Cardinals defense. So hopefully the Steelers add onto their yardage outburst with maybe is it greedy Matt to say a thirty.
Point outburst from the offensive. But we should just.
Say over twenty four, over twenty four, let's just play it safe.
Yeah, I think we'd all take that right now, you know, mid week, would you take twenty four points or door number two. I think I'd take twenty four points out of this offense because I don't see Arizona getting to twenty four.
Not against this defense. That's for sure. That'll do it for us today. Thanks has always for giving us a list of Steelers Cardinals one o'clock at Akroscher Stadium. Our local coverage starts on DV at nine am. For Matt Williamson. I'm Tom Opferman.
This has been the Advanced Scout
