The Steelers may have lost their first two preseason games and scored a combined 15 points while doing so, but new offensive coordinator Arthur Smith hasn't lost perspective regarding football in August.
"The old joke where Indy went '0-fer' every year (in the preseason) and they won 13 games almost automatically with (quarterback) Peyton (Manning)," Smith recalled. "And I think there's two teams that have gone '0-fer' (in the regular season) that went undefeated in the preseason, to give context there."
The Steelers are "0-fer" after losses to Houston and Buffalo with only Saturday's game at Detroit left on the preseason schedule.
"Unfortunately, we've had some tough lessons that we gotta clean up," Smith acknowledged.
But he also emphasized the different priorities inherent to preseason football in general.
"As you're mixin' and matchin' (personnel combinations) it is more about individual evaluation," Smith continued. "Nobody likes that. You always want to score 100 points and you don't want to, you know, the first three drives have three sacks and look like that.
"But at the same time, the context of it is it's really more about the evaluation. Whether you get a veteran in there, and we have a unique situation with the quarterbacks, or whatever competitions we have going on, that evaluation is more important."
Practices can, likewise, be misleading and at the same time revealing.
"In these practices, the quarterback's not 'live,'" Smith explained. "Sometimes you get away with things, may not blow the whistle (in a situation that might otherwise have resulted in a sack) and you think you're good. And then you get into stadiums …
"The positive is, while you don't like the result, it clearly defines some things we have to fix."
Smith would like to see those things addressed sooner rather than later.
"We certainly need to stay out of obvious pass situations," he said. "Maybe it does limit some of the stuff you may do on third down. If you're talking about third-and-6 or less, you may not wanna show too much there (in a preseason game). But it goes back to this, we gotta execute. "If you play zone (coverage), we gotta be in the right spot, we gotta be in rhythm. And if we get man- (to-man coverage), we gotta beat 'man.' And obviously, we gotta protect (the quarterback)."
The Houston and Buffalo exhibitions have, among other things guys, reminded the Steelers those guys get tackled in August if you let them.
"Preseason can distort reality, good or bad," Smith added. "That's not making excuses. The things that happen in football, no matter how good you think your camp has been and these practices, when you get out there and you have these real dress rehearsals, the same things get people beat at any level of football. When you get off track with pre-snap issues, you're gonna make yourself one-dimensional. That's a hard way to make a living.
"That's not our standard, that's not acceptable, but at the same time I'd rather go through that now than have that happen Week One. We've had a really good camp but the reality is we gotta get out of our own way."
