Steelers Power Rankings Roundup: Pittsburgh near unanimously in the Top 5 after Week 11

The Pittsburgh Steelers have been trending upward all season. Their ongoing red zone woes still need to be addressed, but no team is perfect, and as long as they can reach a league-average percentage at converting touchdowns inside the 20 are still in an enviable position inside their division.

Schematic tinkering is expected in their offensive game plan inside the red zone, and Justin Fields provided a sneak peek of what his packages could look like on the Steelers' final possession in Week 11, but the Steelers are closer to the peak of the NFL mountain today than they are to the league’s pudgy middle they began the season in. 

However, where do they stack up against the league’s formidable teams in the eyes of the national media? Fox Sports’ resident philosopher and Tomlin skeptic Colin Cowherd is the thermometer that measures shifting opinions of the Steelers since the season began. He’s the median fan opinion distilled into sports personality form. 

Since the offseason, Cowherd’s gone from suggesting general manager Omar Khan should trade TJ Watt, George Pickens and three firsts for Caleb Williams, to predicting Tomlin’s losing season. Even after they started the season 3-0, he sounded like Carl Jung referring to how ‘every victory contains the germ of future defeat’ by disparaging their “flip phone” offense, to admitting he was wrong about the Steelers and singing their praises. 

That evolution in thinking is what happens every season to a degree with Tomlin teams. 2022 was the most blatant example. They began the season 2-6, and rattled off four straight wins, including three by one-possession to reach 9-8. This is 2022 on steroids.

Where the Pittsburgh Steelers fall in NFL Power Rankings for Week 12

In most power rankings, the hinge point in the Steelers season came when they replaced Justin Fields with Russell Wilson. The Steelers have the toughest strength of schedule remaining at .493, but a roundup of expert opinions on the Steelers illustrates that the experts have locked in Pittsburgh as the fourth or fifth-best team in the league, with one exception. 

The Steelers and Eagles are interchangeable in most power rankings, which is impressive considering the Eagles were a Super Bowl team two seasons ago. Pittsburgh and Minnesota are the only top 10 teams without franchise quarterbacks or an MVP candidate. Sam Darnold’s odds are long, but the Steelers' most valuable player is on the defensive end while the brain of Mike Tomlin augments their strengths. Darnold is significantly younger than Wilson, but he has also begun to cool down. This is either his Geno Smith arc, or Darnold is about to plummet back to earth in December. 

Russell Wilson is a more reliable figure even if he no longer looks like an ace in his advanced years. He’s throwing home run balls on the outside. Meanwhile, Pittsburgh’s defense is pitching shutouts. George Pickens has recorded 74 or more yards in each of Wilson’s starts. NFL.com’s ranking was the only outlier ranking Minnesota over Pittsburgh. Like Pittsburgh, the Vikings are 8-2 and operating behind a nuclear defense. Former Steelers assistant Brian Flores has engineered a pass rush.

The Chiefs, Bills, and Lions are the teams consistently ahead of Pittsburgh in 90 percent of the minds of experts. The defending champs will always have the high ground in any theoretical ranking as the 2-time defending champions unless they fall off a cliff or Patrick Mahomes suffers a significant injury.  Pittsburgh will have an opportunity to move up when they face the Eagles, Ravens and Chiefs in weeks 15, 16, and 17. 

Josh Allen’s in the pole position for his first MVP, but in the past he’s shown a tendency to hit lengthy rough patches throughout the season. The Lions look impervious as the league’s most dominant team even without their most impactful defender, Aidan Hutchinson, who was the Defensive Player of the Year frontrunner before his season-ending injury. They’re only one game ahead of Minnesota in the NFC North, however, their +159-point differential is 88 points better than Pittsburgh’s, 84 points higher than Minnesota’s and 53 points higher than second-best Buffalo’s +106 scoring margin.

In some respects, Pittsburgh is in an ideal position. They’re not the target of every opponent they face like the defending champs, they don’t feel the pressure of this being a trajectory-altering season for a moribund franchise and local pro sports scene ala Detroit nor are they underdogs anymore. Power rankings are all theoretical. What matters is that Pittsburgh is displaying the traits of a Super Bowl contender.