For coaching the NFL's only perfect team, Mike Tomlin sure does pontificate a lot about his Steelers' imperfections.
Eighteen days ago, after edging the Eagles despite the defense getting drilled on third downs, he observed without solicitation: "It wasn't a perfect performance by any stretch. But we're not looking for perfect. We're looking to be good enough to win."
This past Sunday in Nashville, a week after blowing up the Browns and minutes after outlasting an unbeaten opponent in the Titans, he observed, again without solicitation: "Not a perfect product. We understand that. But I appreciate their efforts. We are perfect from a record standpoint, and so we respect that."
Perfect, right?
The Steelers will carry a 6-0 record into Baltimore for Sunday's 1:02 p.m. kickoff with the Ravens, and they'll do so partly because no one from Tomlin down has betrayed the tiniest trace of satisfaction with the collective performance to date. They've understood where they've struggled, they've underscored those flaws and focused on how to fix them. And, as with the third-down issue between the Philadelphia and Cleveland games, they've done so.
That's the right approach.
No, wait, that's the only approach for a team that's setting its sights on something a lot higher than surviving an outcome from Sunday to Sunday. Because, while perfection's seldom attainable in professional sports, as I'm typing this very sentence, the NFL standings provide proof that Pittsburgh's football team is the most perfect one on the planet. And as such, the bar needs to be raised as high as the scope needs to be broad.
So, how does 7-0 sound?
And beating the archrivals?
And beating them in their house in front of the first fans allowed this season inside M&T Bank Stadium?
Answer to all of the above questions: Not nearly as good as building up a realistic trajectory toward ... oh, you know.
Seven suggestions I'll humbly offer to help it happen:
7. STRETCH OUT NO. 7
Ben Roethlisberger's been terrific. But a process that began with ensuring his health, then progressed into some of the most efficient passing of his career, can't be complete until he's all the way back with the deep ball.
Or even the intermediate ball.
There's a reason he ranks 29th among the NFL's 38 qualified quarterbacks -- minimum 60 attempts -- with an average pass play of 9.9 yards. And there's a reason he's 32nd with an average attempt that travels only 6.8 yards through the air, right in the neighborhood of New York's finest, Sam Darnold and Daniel Jones.
Ow.
To repeat, what we've witnessed to date has been wonderful. First and foremost, he's healthy, he's fired up and he's done what's been needed to win every game. Add the 68.2% completion rate and the 99.6 QB rating onto that, and it's more than anyone could've hoped.
This, though, is the time for the Steelers to get greedy. Not so much against the Ravens, who boast outstanding outside corners in Jimmy Smith and Marcus Peters, but when broadening that scope. In the NFL of 2020, Ben won't get away with slants and sideways when the games get bigger. He'll need more of the form he finally flashed against the Browns. He'll need to hold it and heave it.
"A lot of it's dictated by the defense, how the flow of the game is," Ben told us Wednesday on his weekly call with reporters, before referencing Tennessee keeping their safeties 10 miles off the line of scrimmage. "We knew coming into that game we wanted to keep the ball, to possess it. From there, the game just kind of dictates."
Which is to say, those safeties never came closer.
Eventually. That's all I'm saying. He's got the weapons in Chase Claypool and James Washington. Eventually.
6. STOP A DIVERSE OFFENSE
The greatest concern I've got for the defense Sunday in Baltimore is the same I'm expecting to have all season: They've got to demonstrate they can shut down an opponent that does more than one thing.
To date, the only two teams that met that criteria were Cleveland and Tennessee. But the Browns performed so catastrophically it was often difficult to discern what Baker Mayfield and company did poorly from what the Steelers did well. And the Titans ... they're unusual. Ryan Tannehill is a singular threat in the passing game. Derrick Henry is a singular threat in the running game. Those guys line up and go, without a whole lot of deceit or decoys.
The Ravens, of course, are different.
Watch this:
That's Lamar Jackson in Philadelphia two weeks ago, Baltimore's most recent game. It's a pass play all the way, and the Eagles drop their linebackers into coverage, settling for a four-man rush in hopes of containing the reigning MVP. And 22 yards after he tucks and takes off, it didn't exactly work out.
The obvious impression is that Lamar's fast. Well, no kidding. But there's more.
"It's about discipline, mostly," Cam Heyward replied when asked Wednesday about defending Jackson. "You've got to communicate, stay in your rush lanes. It can't just be one guy, one cowboy trying to run his own show. ... He's very explosive, and the thing that helps out a lot is that there's an extra blocker. When you hand off to the running back, the quarterback's not going to block. But if the quarterback's running, there's someone else out there for him. In their scheme, they use a big fullback, their wide receivers are willing to block ... they use everybody."
What a test it'll be. And man, what it'd mean if they'd ace it again.
5. IMPROVE HADEN/NELSON
More greed: Both of the Steelers' corners need to return to their respective islands.
A year ago, Joe Haden and Steven Nelson were more responsible for the defense's general excellence than most might've realized. Keith Butler trusted them in man coverage, freeing up Mike Hilton to blitz and Minkah Fitzpatrick to make magic. Everything started with the corners.
Now, not so much.
Haden's conceding a catch on 53.8% of the passes his way, compared to 53.7% last year. That's obviously negligible. But if it seems like his name's been called more frequently, that's because he's being targeted 6.5 times per game, compared to a career-low 5.125 last year. And logic would dictate that's because he's got one interception this year compared to the five last year. He isn't being avoided.
The positive: Haden's been very good the past two weeks
Nelson's decline has been markedly more pronounced. He's conceding a catch on 65% of the passes his way, compared to 50% last year, and he's been beaten for five touchdowns after not having been beaten once in all of 2019. He's got two interceptions, but that hasn't made up for the rest.
Solutions aren't easy. Hilton and Cam Sutton are best on the inside, and Justin Layne, although he's being trusted enough to have been on the field for Tennessee's final drive Sunday, might not be ready to start yet.
As for dropping linebackers or adding defensive backs to help ... no thanks.
"We’ve been very aggressive defensively, I think, in terms of rushing five," Keith Butler was telling us Thursday. "Sometimes we rush four, but a lot of times we pressured the quarterback and trying to tackle the running back on the way trying to press the quarterback. I think that’s probably the biggest thing for us right now. They have to get rid of the ball fast. They don’t have time to go downfield a lot. We try to keep them from doing that."
Translation: The corners need to be better.
Best bet: Nelson figures it out.
4. REALLY REPLACE BUSH
Look, I admired Robert Spillane's human-sacrifice takedown of Henry almost as much as his teammates who invited him to sit in first class on the charter flight home from Nashville. And yeah, that actually happened.
But I'm a long way from being sold on his replacing Devin Bush in anything other than a situational capacity, and I sure hope Tomlin and Butler feel the same.
Neither Spillane nor Ulysees Gilbert has seen anywhere near enough duty to assume Bush's status as the inside linebacker chiefly responsible for dropping into coverage and/or taking away screen options, not to mention as signal-caller. Anyone who thinks so is hoping, and hope doesn't make for much of a plan when the subject is Super Bowl contention.
I'd prefer a hybrid approach to the position. Maybe go with Spillane or Gilbert as two-down guys, then bump Terrell Edmunds up closer to the line, where he's always been more comfortable, anyway. Or just do that with T.E. all the time. He's got the speed, the awareness and an excess of toughness when tackling.
Without going all Bud Carson on anyone here, it just feels like a meaningful solution is more likely to be found through sub-packages than hope. Try them out. Don't lock into Spillane or Gilbert.
3. AVOID PARENTHESES
You know, as in Bush (knee).
And rather than simply knocking on wood, take steps toward achieving that by going heavier on rotations, especially for those in the trenches, especially when facing lesser opponents. After the Ravens, they've got the Cowboys, Bengals and Jaguars before a rematch with the Ravens. And with Mike Vrabel having robbed them of their bye week, they'll get no break between now and the playoffs unless they take the AFC's No. 1 seed. There's no crime, no disrespectful signal sent in rotating more against the bottom-feeders. Just part of business with a long-term view.
Also and related, Diontae Johnson needs to stay on the field.
As Randy Fichtner put it Thursday when that came up, "Diontae is as talented as any players we’ve had here. He’s very skillful and, obviously, you know how exciting and electric he is when he has the ball in his hand. We’ve seen that in punt returns, we’ve seen that in open grass, catch and run situations. You’ve also seen it when he’s been asked to be used as a runner. I think, again, durability and availability is always going to be key. Hopefully, that’s behind us, and we move on."
"It's frustrating," Diontae himself told us Thursday. "But you can't let it beat you down. You just have to continue to keep going."
Staying healthy could easily have topped this list, except that I came up with two more.
2. UM ... STAY THE COURSE?
After all that negativity, it feels fair to highlight that the Steelers have done so, so much right to this stage. And while they understandably aren't willing to celebrate it, they'd also benefit from an awareness that they are, as Ben's stated more than once, "special" in terms of talent, togetherness and what they aim to accomplish.
No. 1 in total defense, allowing 286.3 yards per game.
No. 6 in scoring offense, putting up 30.5 points per game.
Tied for No. 1 in field-goal percentage with Chris Boswell at 9 for 9.
No. 6 in Football Outsiders' overall special teams rankings.
The latter's built on separate top-five rankings in kicking, kickoff coverage and punt coverage. In fact, the only ranking within the special teams in which they haven't done well is punting, and they've since sent Dustin Colquitt pooching ... I mean packing.
As JuJu Smith-Schuster worded it Wednesday, "We're one team all the way, and that goes for all three phases."
1. BEAT BALTIMORE
It's just good for the soul.