Kansas City Chiefs: Behind Enemy Lines With Still Curtain

Pittsburgh’s Offense

What is the latest in LeVeon Bell? Is James Connor going to be able to keep up his Week 1 performance?

DD: Signs do not look good for Bell coming back anytime soon. Bell hasn’t communicated with any of his teammates or Mike Tomlin about a possible comeback. The Steelers also did not list him on the official depth chart for week two, so it looks like the team isn’t expecting to see him in the near future. James Conner looked phenomenal, and a big part of that was his offensive line. Say what you will about Bell, but those guys looked like they were going extra hard for Conner. James is a long way from reaching Le’Veon’s level, but he’s day and night better from last season and simply looks explosive as a north/south runner. Conner can keep his level of play up, but perhaps the numbers will drop a bit.

How does Big Ben look in another season of football? I know he had a bad game against Cleveland, but does he still look like the same guy as he’s aging?

DD: We saw very little of Roethlisberger in the preseason, who played only a handful of drives in the four possible games while the Steelers were searching for his back-up. Historically Big Ben doesn’t perform well in week one, and especially in road games. There’s no doubt Roethlisberger can still sling it, it’s just a matter of getting the rhythm back with his receivers, which was a glaring hole last Sunday. He’s clearly on the downslope of his career, but he’s shown he can still extend plays and command the offense, even if it’s a slightly-lesser shell of the young Big Ben Pittsburgh fell in love with.

Is the Steelers offensive line still as dominant as it has been in years past?

DD: I am hesitant to call this group dominant. When healthy, they are an extremely solid group of guys. The weak link of the offensive line is clearly left tackle, where Alejandro Villanueva finally met Myles Garrett and had his hands full the entire day. I’m not pinning Villanueva as a bad player, but out of the five positions, he’s the one defenses could really frustrate. The rest of the group can still block at an extremely high level, but until I really see this group man-handle a team, I’ll keep the “dominant” label in my back pocket.

What would you say the weakness is on the offensive side of the ball?

DD: With so much talent, it’s hard to find a weakness. But you know as well as everybody who watches football, there’s always one to expose. For the Steelers offense, it’s the turnover bug. I feel like once the offense gets in that small funk where they can’t string together a good drive, Ben starts to become impatient and looks to create plays rather than let them come. On the ground, Conner has never been notorious for fumbles but has got to protect the ball in situations where everybody in the stadium knows the defense needs a big play and tries to strip it.