The Pittsburgh Steelers are one of the original NFL franchises. College football has been around for much longer than the NFL. One of the things that the professional league got right when it was founded is that they decide championships on the field. Before the Super Bowl era, the NFL played championship games. Those pre-Super Bowl championships mean everything to fans of the Detroit Lions and Cleveland Browns.
Karl Roser / Pittsburgh Steelers
Pittsburgh Steelers six Lombardi trophies.
College football relied on a silly ranking system mainly based on the opinions of the press to decide their champion. In 1998, after years of pressure, the NCAA compromised and established the BCS National Championship game that relied on the same silly rankings, but balanced it with ridiculous opinions of the NCAA head coaches or whatever grad assistant they assigned to fill out the card.
The NFL still has playoffs, but they have adopted the hopelessly broken college system over the last decade to create power rankings. Any evaluation of football that relies on style points and eye tests from reporters like Eric Edholm (who produces the rankings for NFL.com), is flawed. It is understandable why they try to emulate a silly system. College football is popular.
Heidi Fang / Las Vegas Review-Journal
Steelers' Damontae Kazee tries to leap over a sliding Jimmy Garoppolo.
The NCAA is where most of the future NFL players hone their craft before they are allowed to turn pro. It is not where the NFL should go to establish how to generate interest in the sport. Case in point, now that Week 3 is complete, Edholm released the new NFL power rankings on the NFL’s website. He ranked the Steelers 16th in the NFL using some very flawed logic.
“Both the offense and defense showed signs of improvement in the win over the Raiders,” Edholm wrote. "That's concerning. The Steelers took Josh Jacobs out of the game, holding him to 62 rushing yards on 17 touches, and they forced Jimmy Garoppolo into enough mistakes that Las Vegas was limited to 18 points.
Matt Canada surely still faces ire from some fans, the offensive design Sunday looked far better (even with that early fullback stuff) than it had previously. Kenny Pickett threw more in rhythm and found lesser-used targets Calvin Austin III and Pat Freiermuth. Now Pittsburgh is 2-1 after a terrible Week 1."
In fairness, it is quite an accurate analysis. The Steelers are not a finished product. It would be worrisome if they were in Week 3. The last time the Steelers started hot was 2020 when they raced out to an 11-0 start that saw them run out of gas. The NFL used some interesting interpretations of their COVID-19 guidelines to slow them down. That fiasco, paired with an aging roster, derailed Pittsburgh. They fell with a whimper in the first round to Baker Mayfield's Browns.
The outrage for Steeler Nation begins when they find the second place in the AFC North Baltimore Ravens, who lost their Week 3 game to Uncle Rico and his band of merry men at number eight. That, of course, would be the Gardner Minshew-led Indianapolis Colts who exposed that the Ravens offense was better under Greg Roman. The Ravens, at 2-1, were ranked seventh in the previous poll.
It didn't take long to find the third-place Cleveland Browns. In the worst tradition of the AP polls, the Browns, who had lost to the Steelers 26-22, were ranked ninth. The Deshaun Watson-led Browns, who could do very little against the Steelers, were ranked seven spots ahead of the first-place AFC North team. Then again, they did play at the beginning of the season, in the long past Week 2. Who can remember such ancient history?
The buffoon who gets paid to do this at NFL.com was not done. Sitting at number 11 is the one-win team in Cincinnati. The Bengals were one of three two-loss teams ranked ahead of Pittsburgh's AFC North division leaders. This list would be more at home in the exquisite comedy stylings of Annie Agar than as a serious evaluation of the NFL.
The Steelers aren't pretty. Mike Tomlin and the gang win ugly, despite Matt Canada, not because of him. The offense was much better against the 1-2 Raiders. They were responsible for all of scoring by Pittsburgh in a game that ended as a win. No Steelers fan is diluting themselves into thinking the current product is good enough to win playoff games.
If the season ended today, the Steelers would win the AFC North, be the No. 2 seed in the conference, and host the Bills at Acrisure Stadium in the playoffs.
— Mark Kaboly (@MarkKaboly) September 25, 2023
Mark Kaboly, who covers the Steelers for The Athletic, deftly points out that the Steelers are currently the number 2 seed in the AFC. It is only Week 3, and a lot of football has to be played, but the BCS came and is about to go because fans were sick of hearing how a loss in November was more critical than September. How can you rank the first-place team in the AFC North who is 1-0 in the division seven spots behind the team they beat all of seven days ago?
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What in the wide world of sports is going on at NFL.com? Do we disregard the results on the field? Has the NFL's website decided to emulate how Pro Football Focus makes up statistics to justify why TJ Watt is not better than Myles Garrett? Sure, Browns fans, pass rush win rate that results in no meaningful impact on the play is as real as the Underpants Gnomes from South Park.
It is incomprehensible that Edholm could surmise that the first-place team in the AFC North is the worst team in the division. The Bengals defense has serious problems, and Joe Burrow has yet to look right since he carried those duffle bags full of cash into his bank. The Ravens are wounded, and the offense is floundering. The Browns, last we checked, still play in Cleveland and have finished last in the AFC North 13 times since the division was formed 20 years ago.
Pittsburgh has a long way to go if they want to seriously contend for the Super Bowl this season. The Steelers have to go all the way from first in the AFC North and second in the conference to first in the conference. Luckily, the Steelers are keenly aware that power rankings don't mean a thing. Especially if they are being compiled by NFL.com.
What do you think, Steeler Nation? Are you shocked the NFL power rankings have the Steelers fourth in the AFC North? Please comment below or on my Twitter / X: @thebubbasq.
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