Pittsburgh's 2019 DVOA Stats Paint Pretty 2020 Picture

• T.J. Watt and Bud Dupree combined for 26 sacks last season.

• Finishing 8-8, the Pittsburgh Steelers would have fared much better had their offense pulled its own weight.

• Pittsburgh's defense was the only team to finish inside the top-three in passing DVOA and rushing DVOA.

• The Steelers are +350 to win the AFC North and +2500 to win it all.

An Elite Defense

The Pittsburgh Steelers featured one of the top defensive units in the NFL during the 2019 season. Anchored by T.J. Watt and Bud Dupree, who combined for 26 sacks, the Steelers defense was the main reason why the team remained in playoff contention until the final weeks of the season. Ending with a 8-8 record was valuable for Pittsburgh considering their offensive struggles and their injury woes.

The advanced stats don't lie and judging by most metrics, the Steelers were one of the top defensive teams in the league. One advanced stat where Pittsburgh led the league was weighted defense. According to Pro Football Outsiders, that metric is adjusted so that earlier games in the season become gradually less important. In other words, it better reflects how the team was playing at the end of the season. Pittsburgh finished first in the league in the category with a -24.3 percent mark. To put things into perspective, the second-best team in that department, the Baltimore Ravens, were almost 4.0 points below the Steelers at -20.4 percent. Only four teams in the league finished with a rating above -15.0 percent.

This wasn’t the only advanced stat where the Steelers ranked among the best teams in the league. Pittsburgh also finished as the third-best team in the NFL according to Defensive DVOA (Defense-adjusted Value Over Average).

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A Well-Balanced Machine

The Steelers were also the only team to finish top-three in both passing DVOA (third) and rushing DVOA, as well as the overall DVOA value. This not only suggests the Steelers were excellent defensively per most advanced metrics, it also means that the team didn’t show glaring weaknesses against the pass or run. That consistency kept the team in most games despite the subpar play from quarterbacks, wide receivers and running backs in 2019.

Even when the numbers are not adjusted to an average schedule of opponents and an average percentage of fumbles recovered by the defense, as it is the case with DVOA according to Pro Football Outsiders, the Steelers defensive unit still looked dominant. They were third in non-adjusted total DVOA, fifth in non-adjusted passing DVOA and fourth in non-adjusted rushing DVOA. No other team finished inside the top-five in all three categories.

The Steelers are poised to make some noise in the 2020 campaign, and healthy seasons from Ben Roethlisberger and James Conner, as well as a bounce-back performance from star receiver JuJu Smith-Schuster, could go a long way towards making the Steelers a playoff contender in the AFC once again. However, the franchise’s identity has changed. This is now a defensive-minded team, and the stats from the 2019 season back that up.

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