The Pittsburgh Steelers escaped Heinz Field on Sunday with a 30-27 victory over the Cleveland Browns.
For as good as the Steelers looked in the first half of the game, they looked equally as bad at times in the second half.
However a win is a win and Mike Tomlin’s team started the 2014 season in much better fashion than it did a season ago.
With that being said, I am back for the third year in a row to give you my report card following every game.
Let’s get right into how the Steelers graded out after the first week of the season.
Quarterback: Ben Roethlisberger was absolutely amazing early on, with a very efficient first half, throwing for a career-high 278 yards, including a sensational 35-yard touchdown throw to Antonio Brown. Big Ben didn’t do nearly as much in the second half, but made two big throws to get the team in field goal range to win the game. He finished the day completing 23-of-34 passes for 365 yards, a touchdown and an interception. If he plays that way all year, this offense will be scary. Grade: A
Running Backs: Le’Veon Bell impressed in a big way, finishing with 197 combined yards, including 109 yards rushing, a 5.2-yard average. Even better, Bell was a threat catching the football where he had six catches for 88 yards. LeGarrette Blount also found the end zone on one of his four carries. You couldn’t ask much more from this group to open the season. Grade: A
Wide Receivers: Antonio Brown had a big first half with five catches for 116 yards, but was targeted only once in the second half. The story for me though was second-year pro Markus Wheaton, who made big plays in showing he can handle being the Steelers No. 2 wide receiver. None was bigger than back-to-back catches for 32 yards on the winning field-goal drive. Justin Brown and Heath Miller also made a few plays in the win. Grade: A-
Offensive Line: The first game under Mike Munchak’s tutelage saw mixed results as the Steelers line was near perfect in the half, but broke down some in the second. A Kelvin Beachum holding penalty wiped out a touchdown, but when it was all said and done the Steelers rushed for a pair of touchdowns and averaged 4.5 yards per carry. Roethlisberger was sacked four times though. Grade: B-
Defensive Line: Stopping the run is still a big problem as the Browns ran for 183 yards (122 in the second half) and averaged 6.1 yards per carry. Even worse, they got big chunks of yardage, including six carries that went for over 15 yards. Their grade would be worse if not for Cameron Heyward coming up with a big sack on Cleveland’s final drive. Grade: D+
Linebackers: The linebackers were just as bad as they produced a countless number of missed tackles. Ryan Shazier had a couple of nice stops and Jarvis Jones had a sack, but you didn’t get much from Jason Worilds and Lawrence Timmons. When Troy Polamalu, Mike Mitchell and Cortez Allen are the leading tacklers for the game, you know it was a poor day from the group. Grade: D
Secondary: Brian Hoyer had 187 of his 230 passing yards in the second half and kept the defense off-balance. William Gay was pretty solid, making a couple of big plays, but Ike Taylor was not very good again. The safeties played above average, but this secondary still scares me a ton. Grade: C-
Special Teams: Take Brown’s idiotic penalty for a kick to the head out of the equation and it was a very good day for the Steelers’ special teams. We saw a fake punt work, great coverage all day and some good things out of the return units. And Shaun Suisham closed each half with a field goal to make it a very nice day. Grade: A-
Coaching: There’s really no excuse for failing to protect a 27-3 halftime lead. Teams are going to speed the game on the Steelers and run the ball on them until they can prove that they can stop things consistently. Throw in the fact that the team had 11 penalties for 96 yards and this coaching staff needs to get things cleaned up in a hurry. A win is a win though. Grade: C
Photo Credit: Getty Images
