Everyone knows the story of the tortoise and the hare. It wasn't the speedy hare that sprinted out of the gate that won the race. It was the slow but steady tortoise.
The Steelers have taken that old fable to a new level.
The Steelers have scored just three points on their opening possession of their first four games, recording just five first downs along the way.
It hasn't kept them from coming out on the winning end of things on the scoreboard, as the team is off to its first 4-0 start since 1979. But if they want to improve to 5-0 Sunday at Heinz Field against the Browns (4-1), it would behoove them to start more quickly.
The Browns own the NFL's top rushing offense, averaging 188.4 yards per game. And even though the Steelers are allowing just 64 yards rushing per game, falling behind Cleveland will help the Browns play exactly how they want and not force mistake-prone quarterback Baker Mayfield to throw the ball.
The Steelers have outscored their opponents, 20-17, in the first quarter, but the Browns are averaging 30.8 points per game, scoring 12 of their 18 touchdowns this season in the first half of games.
The offensive issues on their opening drive, however, are nothing new for the Steelers. They haven't scored a touchdown on their opening possession of the game since Dec. 16, 2018 against the Patriots, a span of 22 games. Fourteen of those games were played without Ben Roethlisberger at quarterback, but that still means Roethlisberger also is on a streak of eight games without leading a touchdown drive to open a game.
"I’ll take scoring every time, and it doesn’t have to be those 14-play drives either," offensive coordinator Randy Fichtner said. "We will take it in one. Starting fast is obviously something we talked about. We talked about it openly with our players. We always seem to mix in, and I like to take the comfort in the plays that we practiced well, concept plays that are going to have a chance for great success because you have the opportunity to work, you got a clean enough look during the week that you liked. Doesn’t mean you are going to give them that exact look. This is professional football. We adjust. Players have to adjust."
Fichtner has been using the first possession of games, particularly this season, to throw as many different looks at opposing defenses so he can to see what packages the defense uses against it. If it's a look he likes, he might come back to it later.
But it's not added up to scoring on the first possession -- at least not yet. Part of that can be attributed to Roethlisberger coming back from an elbow injury that sidelined him for all but six quarters of 2019. Even though the quarterback is off to the best statistical start of his career, with 10 touchdown passes, one interception and a 110.4 passer rating, he's started slowly.
Roethlisberger's first-quarter passer rating is just 72.1. But it balloons to 142.6 in the second quarter, when he's thrown six of his touchdown passes.
Mayfield, on the other hand, has been the exact opposite. He gets worse as the game goes on. His passer rating in the first half of games this season is 110.4. In the second half, it falls to 45.5, including a putrid 27.8 in the fourth quarter. If a quarterback simply took the snap and spiked the ball, his passer rating would be 39.6.
He's also dealing with a rib injury suffered in last week's win over the Colts that left him limited in practice on Wednesday, though he said he expects to play against the Steelers.
While not as pronounced as this season, the fourth quarter has been an issue for Mayfield throughout his career. He has a career passer rating of 74.8 in the final 15 minutes of games, having thrown 14 touchdown passes and 15 interceptions in the final quarter in 34 career starts.
So the idea for the Steelers -- as it is in every game -- should be to get a lead and force Mayfield to throw.
"The ability to maintain balance thoughtfully, the ability to remain thoughtfully non-rhythmic if you will, offensively is good," Mike Tomlin said. "Also, to be able to discourage people from running the ball like you are capable of doing when you are not behind is good. I just think those are natural things. They are not exclusive to us or our circumstance. I think that would apply to anybody who is playing with the lead as opposed to someone who is coming from behind."
But it might be even more so the case this week. If the Browns get ahead or keep things close, they'll be able to stick with what has been a potent running game. If they get behind, it places the game in the hands of Mayfield.
Even though he's taking better care of the football this season than he has earlier in his career, he's still thrown four interceptions and fumbled once. That's fewer than the 35 interceptions and 14 fumbles he had in his first 31 career games.
But starting quickly for the Steelers, who are now averaging 29.5. points per game, sure would help take Mayfield out of his comfort zone.
"The challenge comes back to us," Fichtner said. "It comes back to a loss yardage play here, maybe a penalty. It’s going to be hard to overcome the third-and-longs. And generally, that is kind of what’s happened in the first series. They look at me and say start fast. The object is to score, and we would like to score every series. Obviously, the first series is as important as ever, and we would like to try to score on the first series. We are going to keep working on it."