Earlier this season I decided to switch up how I report the grades by Pro Football Focus (PFF) because of some of the absurdity of their findings. Since it seemed to be the most receptive approach, I decided to make this a weekly thing where I give my opinion of the PFF scores.

As always has to be the case when PFF is mentioned, the disclaimer is these grades are subjective and merely the opinion of those doing the evaluation. While PFF looks at every player on every snap, they are still simply forming an opinion of what they believe that player was supposed to be doing that play in order to determine if they were successful or not.

So here are my overall impressions of the scores from the Steelers Week 12 win over the Bengals with my grade of PFF at the end.

Offense

To start off, there were two players on the Steelers offense who had scores in the 90s this week. The first was Pat Freiermuth with a 93.5 overall score and a 93.5 passing score. Freiermuth had the highest overall score of any tight end in Week 12. Additionally, he had the highest receiving score of any player regardless of position.

The other player who scored in the 90s for the Steelers was Kenny Pickett with a 91.6 overall score and a 91.8 passing score. Pickett was the third highest overall quarterback score this week only behind Dak Prescott (97.0) and Josh Allen (93.3). As for his passing score, it was the second highest only behind Prescott (95.3). While I thought Pickett had a much improved game, I expected his scores to be much better than the last few weeks but didn’t know it would be quite so high. It was the second highest score of Pickett’s career behind his 92.4 last season in Week 17 against the Ravens.

There were two scores in the 70s for the Steelers offense in Najee Harris (77.5) and Darnell Washington (76.5). Harris’ score was topped with an 83.7 running score which was third this week outside of Monday night only behind David Montgomery (89.9) and Christian McCaffrey (88.2). What brought Harris’ score down was a 54.5 passing score and an 18.7 pass blocking score. As for Washington, his 74.3 run blocking score, the highest of the Steelers offense, is what contributed the most to his good grade.

The offensive line didn’t stand out in a great way with their scores as Mason Cole lead the way with a 64.0 followed by Dan Moore Jr. (63.6) and Broderick Jones (63.5). Jones had the second highest run blocking score of 69.3 but only had a 51.8 pass blocking score which was the lowest of the offensive linemen.

In a reversal from last week, James Daniels (53.5) and Jaylen Warren (52.5) were at the bottom of the Steelers scores with the only one lower being Miles Boykin (43.5). Warren had a 78.3 passing score but only a 46.6 rushing score and a 28.6 pass blocking score. Daniels was brought down by a 48.2 run blocking score.

Defense

The Steelers defense also landed with two players that had scores in the 90s this week. T.J. Watt led the way with a 90.7 overall score as all his individual scores were all at least 75 or above. The other player was Trenton Thompson with a 90.1 overall and his team-leading coverage score of 85.4.

The Steelers had four other defenders that scored in the 70s with Alex Highsmith just missing out on an 80 with a 79.9 overall score. Highsmith had the top pass rushing grade (86.9) just ahead of Watt’s 84.1. Other overall scores in the 70s were Elandon Roberts with a 79.7 and his team-leading 81.7 run defense score. The other two players were Patrick Peterson (74.8) and Cam Heyward (72.8). Keeanu Benton just missed the 70s with a 69.3 overall.

Some of the most interesting numbers came from players who saw a limited number of snaps. DeMarvin Leal only played three defensive snaps and didn’t move the needle at all and ended up with a 60.0. Miles Killebrew started the game but that was the only snap he played on defense and finished with a 60.0. Isaiahh Loudermilk only saw three snaps and had a 57.4. Markus Golden played four snaps and, despite having a 56.1 pass rush score which was three of the four snaps, landed with a team-low 30.3 overall based on a 21.5 tackling score.

The most curious score on the defense is for Nick Herbig. Only playing three snaps, Herbig had one of the Steelers four sacks. With a 60.0 coverage score and a 60.0 score on run defense, Herbig had a 70.5 tackling score and a 70.8 pass rushing score. So with two scores at 60.0 and two scores just above 70, how did Herbig finish with an overall score of 56.8? So everything he did was either average or above average yet had a below average score based on three snaps.

Overall

With nothing once again standing out on special teams other than a couple of low scores by players who receive penalties, the overall scores lined up pretty well this time. I’m still not convinced Kenny Pickett deserved that great of a grade. Yes I thought he played much better, but there were plenty of other quarterbacks who performed better in Week 12 yet the scores did not come out that way.

Also, that anomaly with Nick Herbig just makes you doubt everything that PFF does. How can a player score that high in two of his four categories I have nothing below a 60.0 other than his overall score? Damontae Kazee was another example as his overall score (55.5) was lower than his individual marks and his 84.0 tackling score was best on the team.

But seeing outstanding scores by players such as T.J. Watt, Trenton Thompson, and Pat Freiermuth does pass the eye test this week. So it is possible that PFF can get some, or even most, things pretty close while being way off with others.

My grade of this week’s PFF scores: C+