Your regular “5 plays” film room has been interrupted this week to bring you a more in-depth analysis of the two players whose day at Heinz Field really summed up the offensive struggles of the Pittsburgh Steelers, JuJu Smith-Schuster and Mason Rudolph. In this part we’ll look at Smith-Schuster and why he ended up having so little impact in this game. In part 2 we’ll look at Mason Rudolph’s day.

A near miss

The first play of the game was a 12 yard pass from Rudolph to Smith-Schuster. After 2 more plays and another first down Rudolph went back to Smith-Schuster, this time with a deep ball down the sideline.

JuJu Smith-Schuster is split out wide to the top of the screen.

A week after the youngest Steelers WR proclaimed that if it’s 1v1 he’s open Rudolph trusts him and throws a beautiful deep ball. For his part JuJu Smith-Schuster runs a good route and nearly makes the catch. The defender plays it perfectly with hand-fighting that stays in the acceptable range and defends the ball with perfect timing hitting Smith-Schuster’s arm as the ball arrives. Here’s a closer look at the defense and near catch.

The ball hits the tips of his fingers as the defender hits his arm. Perfect defense there and still a near big play. That’s the kind of play that tells you to try it again, because the CB was close to pass interference there and the play almost worked anyway. So after a loss on a run play Mason Rudolph goes back to JuJu Smith-Schuster, his third target on the first drive of the game.

A costly miss

Smith-Schuster is lined up outside to the top of the screen.

This is just a nice simple hook route attacking a small gap in the Colts modified zone look that shows up a good amount in this game where JuJu Smith-Schuster has a shadow. Rudolph does a good job of looking right to start and then coming back to Smith-Schuster. The problem is the throw is into a tight window and Rudolph misses it. Here’s a better look.

You can see that this is hook route here, not an in-cut. That ball should be in his chest or lower. There are numerous defenders around him, there’s no chance for YAC and he’s past the first down marker, the pass should lead him to the ground. You can see Smith-Schuster drop his body and arm as he’s looking to find the ball. He sees it is high, jumps and extends but his hands aren’t there in time and only contact the back half of the ball.

I know the rule is that if you tough the ball you have to catch it, but Smith-Schuster can’t really do better than this here. He has great reflexes and hand speed, but that ball was on time and too far away from where it should have been for a catch. This is why you don’t throw this route high. If Rudolph leads his receiver to the ground there’s almost no chance for an interception, but any ball tipped up here is a likely pick.

After this play JuJu Smith-Schuster would only be targeted twice for the rest of the game. Mason Rudolph didn’t throw to his #1 WR again for 22 minutes of game time. Three targets in the first three minutes and two more over the next 57 minutes.

Another turnover

The next time Smith-Schuster was targeted was on 4th and 2 with the Steelers trailing 10-3.

This time he is behind the line right next to Alejandro Villanueva.

The television crew said Mason Rudolph was late getting rid of the ball, but that’s not why this didn’t work. Look at B.J. Finney pulling from LG, Darrius Leonard is his responsibility but for some reason he changes targets and runs out of the play enough that Smith-Schuster’s best shot is to just crash into the line and hope for the best. Even if Finney seals Leonard inside this play isn’t getting the first down here, because Ryan Switzer acts like a teenager forced to give their younger sibling a hug as he deftly evades blocking his man, then turns around to look and see if it worked. Even with those fails, if Matt Feiler had successfully driven his man instead of slipping off of him the play might have done something in-spite of the other blocks that didn’t happen. Three blocks that didn’t happen end with the Colts getting the ball back.

Fortunately for the Steelers Minkah Fitzpatrick decided that if the offense couldn’t finish a drive he would do it for them as he scored on the Colts ensuing possession with the longest Interception return for a TD since the Steelers first year as a franchise.

Can’t buy a target

For the last play of part 1 here’s a play from the first quarter, on this drive Trey Edmunds breaks a 45 yard run, James Washington makes a sick catch and the Steelers end up with 3rd down on the Colts 3 yard line.

JuJu Smith-Schuter is in the slot to the top of the screen, he goes into motion right before the snap.

This play is designed to get Smith-Schuster an easy reception after running through the line with a chance to fight for the TD. It doesn’t go well. The timing of the motion and the snap is clearly off, Smith-Schuster has to run around Villanueva and the whole play falls apart. Rudolph is dealing with a DE when his target finally makes it through the line and the defense has time to close on the play before Rudolph has a clean look at Smith-Schuster. From there Rudolph just scrambles and throws the ball away.

This play is a good summation of JuJu Smith-Schuster’s day. He had one good target that he turned into a 12 yard catch on the first play of the game, and from then on his day just got worse and worse. To get a complete view of the offense’s nightmare of a game we’ll need to look at Mason Rudolph’s day, so stay tuned for part 2.