Steelers Chalk Talk: The loss in Cleveland was a product of game management and execution

I...

You know, the, h- the Steelers get the football after forcing a punt on Cleveland's opening possession and they author a phenomenal drive.

What an opening drive.

17 plays, 78 yards.

They take almost 10 minutes of game clock.

9:48 off the clock.

It's really well-balanced.

Nine passes, eight runs, finishes with a touchdown.

I mean, you could not have started the game any better if you were the Steelers.

They're blocking their asses off on the perimeter.

The touchdown technically goes down as a touchdown pass for Aaron Rodgers even though he just flicked the ball about [laughs] two feet forward to Roman Wilson who's coming through on the jet sweep.

But as Wilson turns the corner, he gets phenomenal blocks on the perimeter from Michael Pittman and Pat Freiermuth as they just open up a wide lane and he kind of dances into the end zone there.

7-0 Steelers and you say to yourself, "All right, man.

This is a phenomenal start.

I love the balance in the offense right now.

They are physical.

They're blocking on the perimeter.

McCarthy's being creative." They ran, they ran one play on that drive that went for about a nine-yard run to Jalen Warren.

Double C gap insert.

Both wide receivers, Jeremy Bernard and Ben Skowronek, both insert through the C gap.

We've seen a lot of, a lot of that insert play from the Steelers.

They, they ran, they ran it last week for a touchdown to Skowronek where he motioned across, inserted into the C gap and ran by Cincinnati secondary for a touchdown.

But they ran it on the opening drive last night with two receivers inserting through the C gap, both of which w- you know, one blocked the linebacker, one blocked the safety.

Skowronek and Bernard and Jalen Warren went for nine yards.

Beautiful design.