The Steelers faced some unknown last week in Atlanta because the Falcons had a whole new coaching staff and also didn’t play any of their starters in the preseason.
And while Atlanta had some success offensively on their first possession, driving inside the 10-yard line before eventually settling for a field goal, the Steelers figured things out pretty quickly on defense and adjusted accordingly.
Defensive coordinator Teryl Austin finds himself in a similar position this week when the Steelers travel to Denver to face the Broncos and rookie quarterback Bo Nix.
While Nix set a collegiate record for starts in a career with 61 over five seasons with Auburn and Oregon, his track record in the NFL consists of his play in the preseason and his first career start last weekend at Seattle, a game the Broncos lost 26-20.
That doesn’t leave Austin with a lot of game tape to look at to assess the young quarterback’s strengths and weaknesses.
“You look at the preseason,” Austin said of studying Nix this week. “We talk to our scouting department and what they thought of him as a quarterback coming out, his strengths and weaknesses and all those different things. And then what he’s done in the program, because really, the most important thing is what he’s done since he’s been (in Denver).
“And, you know, even though his sample size is small, you can see some of the things that they our guys thought about.”
Nix attempted 42 passes last Sunday against Seattle, completing 26, but for just 138 yards with two interceptions. He was just 2 of 12 on passes that traveled 10 or more yards downfield, throwing both of his interceptions in those instances and posting a passer rating of 2.1.
Overall, he averaged 3.3 yards per pass attempt and 5.3 yards per completion.
But he also led the Broncos with 35 yards rushing, including scoring a touchdown on a 4-yard scramble, showing off more mobility than maybe some had thought.
“I was somewhat surprised by his quarterback mobility,” Steelers head coach Mike Tomlin said. “I thought he was highly effective.”
Keeping Nix from being highly effective in this game will be the task of Austin.
The Steelers are 24-6 against rookie quarterbacks since Mike Tomlin became head coach in 2007. Tomlin’s .800 winning percentage against rookie quarterbacks is third-best in the NFL of any head coach since 1950, trailing only Don Shula and Hank Stram.
But two of those losses came in 2023, as the Steelers lost games started by Houston’s C.J. Stroud and Cleveland’s Dorian Thompson-Robinson.
The Steelers defensively are coming off a game in which they picked off veteran Atlanta quarterback Kirk Cousins twice – one each by defensive newcomers DeShon Elliott and Donte Jackson – and limited the Falcons to just over 50 yards of offense in the second half in an 18-10 win.
The Steelers forced three turnovers in the game, winning the turnover battle 3-0.
Austin would like to carry that momentum over into Week 2.
And he knows that veteran Broncos head coach Sean Payton, one of the top offensive minds in the NFL, will have cooked up something different for the Steelers this week, even with a rookie quarterback.
“Everybody knows he is a quality play caller, really, really good,” Austin said. “And he’s going to make you work. He’s going to give you a lot of different formations, a lot of different groupings, a lot of different things and he’s going to test your defense in terms of if you’re structurally sound and all those things.
“So he makes it hard for you. The thing that we have got to do is make sure that we’re really structurally sound, and we’re not leaving people open. But he’s going to present a big challenge for us this week.”
But at least there’s a long track record available of what Payton likes to do.
With Nix, there’s still a lot of unknowns.
“You don’t know what his particular strengths and weaknesses are,” Austin said. “And so some of that stuff we’ll figure out and find out on the run. I know all the things leading up into the draft and the things that have been said about him that everybody thought he was a really competent guy, really had a handle on football and being able to handle a lot of things.
“So, you know, so we just don’t know what we’re going to end up seeing, but it’s always a challenge.”
