After Joe Haden helped shut out Atlanta's Julio Jones in the first three quarters of the Steelers' 41-17 win over the Atlanta Falcons, the immediate response was that the same tactic should be used again this week against Cincinnati's A.J. Green.
It worked once, after all, so why not again?
And with the Steelers (2-2-1) needing a victory against the Bengals (4-1) in their meeting Sunday at Paul Brown Stadium, finding a way to shut down the explosive Green will be critical to those efforts.
But simply putting Haden on Green -- or the opponent's best receiver -- each week might not be the panacea many might think. There is, after all, a reason why so few top cornerbacks actually travel with the opposing team's best receiver on a week-to-week basis.
First and foremost, it puts a lot of pressure on one guy to perform against another in a league that has the rules clearly set up against him.
"Joe’s a special talent and it obviously helps a ton to have a Pro Bowl corner on your team," dime linebacker L.J. Fort told me. "But it’s not all on the back end. The rush and coverage works together. Some people might be like ‘Oh, the secondary is getting torn apart,’ but the guys up front and the linebackers need to do their part, too. So, it’s the defense as a whole."
While one guy -- in this case, Haden -- gets a lot of credit for helping to limit Jones, who finished with five meaningless receptions for 62 yards after the game had long been decided, it's a total defensive effort.
That's why it might not make sense for the Steelers to do the same with Green. With the emergence of former Pitt receiver Tyler Boyd, Green is no longer the only threat the Steelers must be concerned about.
In eight games against the Bengals while with Cleveland, Haden helped limit Green to 19 receptions for 323 yards and two touchdowns on 41 pass attempts when he was in coverage.
In his only meeting with Cincinnati last season -- Haden missed the rematch in Cincinnati with a broken leg -- Haden didn't shadow Green. But he was part of an effort that limited him to three receptions for 41 yards on six targets. Two of those targets came against Haden, one of which he turned into his first interception with the Steelers, plucking an errant pass out of the air.
The Bengals don't know what to expect because of that, even though Haden has matched up with Green in the past while a member of the Browns before joining the Steelers last season.
"I can't tell that," Bengals head coach Marvin Lewis said when I asked if he expected to see Haden shadow Green this week. "Joe's a fine player, no question about that. I've seen Joe since he came into the league with the Browns. He does a great job. When you play corner in the National Football League, you've got to be a guy who not only has the physical talent, but also the mental aptitude. He shows that."
The Steelers haven't decided if they will have Haden shadow Green, either. One of the reasons for that is the emergence of Boyd as a threat. Boyd leads the Bengals with 30 receptions -- four more than Green -- while his 393 yards are only 16 fewer.
"No question it does," Lewis said when I asked if that takes pressure off of Green. "He has really grown in his role."
Like many teams, the Bengals also move Green around. He's done a lot of damage from the slot this season, including all three of his touchdown catches in a Week 2 win over the Ravens.
And many teams don't like to move their outside corners to the slot in those cases because it then puts their usually smaller slot corner -- in this case for the Steelers, 5-foot-9 Mike Hilton -- on the outside where they are not used to playing. It also changes some of the roles for the other defenders.
"It’s always about the trickle-down effect when you’re talking about traveling with someone – not only the physical challenges of the personnel matchups, but when they’re moving people, who else are they moving and what does that do," Mike Tomlin said. "That’s always an element of the equation. When we’re considering this week, it’ll be an element of the equation, but it’s a multi-layered discussion and it’s not just about the person that you’re working to neutralize."
Not only did the Steelers need Haden to have a big game in a tough matchup against Jones last week, they needed the other guys in coverage to be solid in their matchups. Otherwise, Atlanta's other receivers, Calvin Ridley and Mohamed Sanu, could foil the plan.
In that respect, Artie Burns and Coty Sensabaugh, who have been splitting time opposite Haden, and Hilton came up big, as did safeties Sean Davis and Terrell Edmunds. Haden got plenty of safety help, but Burns and Sensabaugh, in particular, had strong days in coverage.
Burns allowed three receptions on six passes thrown his way for 32 yards. Sensabaugh did not allow the only pass thrown his way to be completed.
But communication in those situations is critical. Players have to know their assignments based on where Green might be if Haden would, in fact, follow Green.
The Steelers were without main play-caller Vince Williams against the Falcons, leaving Fort and Tyler Matakevich to relay the calls from the sideline. They not only did that through the headsets in the helmets of those two players, but with hand signals as well.
"When Heinz Field gets rocking, you can’t communicate verbally, so you always have to have hand signals," Fort told me. "Every week we’re going to learn from stuff and get better. The communication from last week to this week is probably going to be something else. Hopefully, we can just keep building on it and get better."
Pass rush helped with that. The Steelers had six sacks and 11 quarterback hits in the game, making life uncomfortable for quarterback Matt Ryan. Even if the coverage wasn't perhaps where it should be, Ryan didn't have time to figure it out.
Cincinnati's Andy Dalton has been sacked just nine times on 187 pass attempts this season behind an improved offensive line. Perhaps more importantly, the Bengals have done an excellent job of keeping him from being consistently pressured. He's been hit no more than four times in any game this season.
The Steelers lead the league in sacks with 19 and have been very good in most games of letting opposing quarterbacks know they are there even if they don't get a sack. They have recorded double digits in pressures in three of their five games. Not surprisingly, the two games in which they didn't reach that number came in losses to Kansas City and Baltimore.
So replicating the success of Jones against Green might not be as easy as just telling Haden to lock him down.
"It’s not, no," Tomlin said.