The Seven Pittsburgh Didn't Have to Score

Pittsburgh's offense scored 13 points at Acrisure Stadium on Sunday, and the Falcons lost by seven. The other seven came with 14:05 left: second-and-10 at the Atlanta 44, shotgun, a short throw to the right meant for Bijan Robinson that T.J. Watt anticipated, snatched just after it left Cooper Rush's hand, per the AP, and carried 35 yards the other way. Pittsburgh 20, Atlanta 13, and the box score puts the margin in Atlanta's columns. Four of them lost the game. Two of them worked.

The four columns

The first interception, deep middle for Jahan Dotson at 12:17 of the second quarter, gave Jaquan Brisker the ball at the Atlanta 31, and Pat Freiermuth scored four plays later. Of the 13 points Atlanta's defense allowed, the touchdown came on a 31-yard field it did not create. Zachariah Branch had returned the preceding kickoff 64 yards to the Pittsburgh 32, and a holding call on Josh Woods put the ball at the Atlanta 24 instead. One flag moved a first down 44 yards backward; the next throw handed it to Pittsburgh.

Nick Folk's misses were from 54 and 45, both wide right, both with the score 7-13, per ESPN's play-by-play. Six points not scored in a seven-point loss is the arithmetic. That is not the same as saying two makes win it; a made 54-yarder at 2:38 of the second quarter changes everything after it. Kevin Stefanski, to the AP: "Nick's not going to be perfect this year, I don't expect him to be perfect." A coach not changing kickers, nothing more.

Third down was 2 of 12 at an average of 9.3 yards to go, seven of the 12 at eight or longer, and three holding calls built that list: Matthew Bergeron's (second-and-9 to second-and-19), Chris Lindstrom's (an eight-yard Drake London catch erased, second-and-19 again, on the drive that ended in the 54-yard miss) and Jake Matthews's (first-and-10 to first-and-20). Nine penalties for 96 yards, and the two on A.J. Terrell Jr., a defensive hold that wiped out a Maason Smith sack and a 37-yard pass interference, supplied 42 of the 61 yards on Pittsburgh's longest scoring drive. Both third-and-1s were Robinson runs; both failed (yes, both).

The two that worked

Atlanta ran for 120 yards on 31 carries against a front with Watt, Alex Highsmith and Cameron Heyward, with a quarterback who had been on the roster 46 days. Nine of 16 first downs came on the ground, four through the air. Robinson touched it 29 times for 173 of the team's 238 yards; his third quarter alone was 11 touches for 73.

The defense allowed 13 points, 58 rushing yards on 21 carries and 3 of 13 on third down. Aaron Rodgers averaged 5.5 yards per attempt; Pittsburgh netted 4.8 per pass play. Za'Darius Smith had both sacks. That is a defense that did its share.

What the offense was without the shot

Here is what the passing numbers actually tell you. Rush was 12 of 22 for 143 yards, sacked four times, for 118 net yards and 4.5 per dropback. Ten of his 19 targeted throws went to Robinson, who caught eight for 90 yards; the other 12 attempts produced four completions for 53 yards and the Brisker interception. London caught 2 of 4 targets for 29. Kyle Pitts was targeted once, incomplete. ESPN labels five throws deep: two complete for 40 yards, two incomplete, one intercepted.

Stefanski's pre-kickoff instruction to Rush, relayed by ProFootballTalk from ESPN, was "Simple: be yourself. Operate the offense. Get the ball out quickly to your playmakers." That is what it looked like; the pick-six was the instruction taken literally. Afterward Stefanski told the AP, "We're going to keep leaning on him in all these games, and we have to." The plan is Robinson, and the defense knows it.

Tommy Rees told ESPN this month that Atlanta's quarterbacks would work much more often under center with play-action showcased, as I noted Friday. ESPN's play-by-play tags the touchdown, both interceptions and all four sacks as shotgun snaps; the two longest completions to wide receivers, London for 21 and Dotson for 19, carry no such tag. Those are ESPN's tags, not a personnel record. Play-action rate, time to throw, depth of target and where Watt and Highsmith aligned against Matthews's edge are not in anything I could reach tonight; the tape owes those, and I will not invent them.

One road game with a quarterback who could not threaten the shot, against that front, is encouraging in the run game and the defense, damning on third down and in the turnover column, and not a trend in either direction. Carolina, also 0-1, comes to Mercedes-Benz Stadium next Sunday at 1:00 PM ET, per ESPN's schedule; every team in the NFC South lost Sunday. Lindstrom left with a concussion on the Watt return, with no Week 2 status yet for him or anyone else.

The Falcons have never won in Pittsburgh, per the AP. On Sunday the unit that came closest to changing that was the one nobody here, me included, spent the week writing about.