Steelers Defense Get Brutal Wake-Up Call

Jalen Ramsey has been an impact player for the Steelers in his first two games. He won the contest for the team in Week 1 with a bone-crunching hit on Garrett Wilson and recorded his first interception of the season against the Seahawks. He also had some of his coverage flaws exposed by the Seattle passing game. Working in multiple slants and crossing routes, Ramsey’s slight decrease in foot speed was evident and the Seahawks were able to have two 90-yard receivers in the win.

But at least Ramsey has an interception and other strong plays to make up for the fact that he’s being asked to patrol the entire secondary single-handedly. That’s more than the two other superstars on the defense can say. Defensive tackle Cam Heyward and edge rusher T.J. Watt haven’t made any impact on the game through two weeks.

Watt’s invisibility is easily explained. Opposing offenses are avoiding him and when forced to go at him, they’re throwing multiple blockers at him. The Jets didn’t even bother running towards Watt’s side of the ball, and he was routinely chipped and double teamed on his pass rushes. He’s a game breaker and offenses do everything they can to stop him.

Beyond those three names, there’s players like Alex Highsmith and Joey Porter Jr and Darius Slay and Patrick Queen. It’s an imposing group on paper, but on the field they are being quickly exposed as a mediocre defense.

Captain Leads the Way

Cam Hayward’s performance always matter to this team, but it’s the key to unlocking this Steelers defense. Especially as Watt attracts all of the attention around the line of scrimmage and Ramsey patrols the secondary, Heyward has to be the difference maker. He’s done some things well, to his defense. In a very poor run stopping defense, he’s at least been consistent in plugging gaps and making a strong amount of the possible tackles he could.

But Heyward has the ability to get after the quarterback like nearly no other defensive tackle in the NFL can. We haven’t seen any bit of that ability, however. Maybe it was the offseason contract drama or maybe it’s Father Time finally catching up, but the defensive captain has to find more to his game quickly to get this team back on track.

Of course, the Steelers can take this loss and learn from it. With a group of multiple Pro Bowlers and former All-Pro players, there’s plenty of reason to believe they can fix things before it’s too late. However, that’s dependent on them not ignoring this blaring and desperate wake-up call.