PITTSBURGH (93.7 The Fan) – Still adjusting to the weekly Steelers head coach’s news conference on Monday, here are a number of thoughts from Mike McCarthy on Monday including a key receiver injury, helping another receiver, the offensive line and more.
Michael Pittman
Out for the game in New England, McCarthy is not sure veteran receiver Michael Pittman will play Sunday against the Bengals. The 28-year-old has a foot injury which is unrelated to the injury that kept Pittman out a good chunk of training camp.
“I know he made progress. He's in the evaluation group for Wednesday
morning, and hopefully we'll have a good plan for him, but I don't have a feel one way or the other if he's going to be available this week.”
Pittman had a team-best 58 yards on three receptions in the opener.
DK
A few drops and just 8 receptions for 67 yards on 19 targets in his first two games, it’s been a slow start for DK Metcalf in year two of a four-year, $132 million contract. What is the message to the number one receiver?
“We believe in DK,” said Steelers offensive coordinator Brian Angelichio. “DK has been a really good player in this league. He's been a productive player, so we have tremendous confidence in him. We're just going to keep practicing and
keep believing in DK, and we know that he'll be the player we want him to be.”
McCarthy said they are looking at everything with Metcalf from training to honing his motor-skills. They will also look at other ways to get him involved earlier in games.
“These guys are the best of the best, so when you do have drops, you’ve just got to feed the confidence component of it, and that will be our approach with any of our players,”. McCarthy said.
Joey Porter, Junior to be evaluated this week
Offensive line
Struggling as a group, McCarthy puts some of the offensive line issues on himself.
“I think in hindsight you go back (to training camp), and you look how many days did we line up with the same offensive line?” McCarthy said. “We worked a lot of different combinations. No excuses, but they need continuity, they need reps, they need consistency.”
“So, the consistency will come through the common concepts. I think we’ve got to take a hard look, our consistency, starting up front, we need to give our guys more laps, more time on task, and make sure we're asking them to do things that they have plenty of reps in.”
What about Max?
McCarthy dodged a question about personnel changes on the offensive line as a way for better results, but did say about right tackle and 2026 first-round pick Max Iheanachor.
“Max has taken a step each and every week,” McCarthy said. “He had a few snaps the other night. It was good. I thought he had a really good day Thursday in the padded work, the individual work. He's definitely making big steps, so it's getting better.”
3rd down misery
Through two weeks the Steelers are 31st in the NFL in third-down conversions, making only five of 25.
“I think any time you see common mistakes or challenges that happen two weeks in a row, you have to definitely focus on that,” McCarthy said. “We had manageable third downs pretty much most of the game and we didn't convert. I would point to pass protection, the challenge of man-to-man, which is always going to be a challenge in this league. We'll just continue to work on those things, but we got work to do. There's no question.”
Bottom line
“A lot of narratives to the game and so forth, but at the end of the day, our job is to whip the other guy's ass, and we need to make sure we're staying in tune with
that.”
Family
“This football team spends a lot of time together away from the facility. I mean, I've been very, very impressed with a number of our position groups. The defensive backs, the linemen, the D-line. We had our first road game [and] the defense goes out to dinner as a whole, and I think it's a tradition here. I mean, this is a thick group as far as the bond and how they go about it. I feel great about that.”
“I think this locker room has a very strong connection.”
‘Our job is to whip the other guy’s (butt)’
‘Our job is to whip the other guy’s (butt)’
