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 13 loss to the Cardinals with my grade of PFF at the end.

Offense

It is much different trying to evaluate grades this time because my observations came in the stadium. On offense, the top two grades both belong to left guards with Nate Herbig pulling in a 91.8 overall and Isaac Seumalo with 83.6 before he was injured. For my eye test, Seumalo was the best player on offense for the Steelers on the field before he got hurt. As for Herbig, I didn’t really notice him.

A number of the top grades went to players in the offensive line as after George Pickens’ 77.3 overall score, next was Dan Moore Jr. with a 76.5. Pat Freiermuth rounded out the top five in the final score above a 70.0 with his 74.1 overall score.

One score I found surprising was the sixth-highest score of Mason Cole with a 69.4. Not even considering the poor snaps, I didn’t think Cole stood out in a good way at all watching him in stadium. But based on the scores and the statistics, they did not hold Cole responsible for either of the Steelers fumbles. Instead they brought down the rushing scores of both Mitch Trubisky (35.5) and Kenny Pickett (44.8) as they credited them each with a fumble. I wouldn’t put that fumble completely on Trubisky, and the one for Pickett I wouldn’t give him any chance of that being partly his fault as the ball was on the ground before it got to him.

As for scores at the bottom, Connor Heyward had the lowest of anyone by a large margin with a 29.6 overall score which was based on a 34.6 passing score. As bad as his drop was which was right in front of me, I could see why. Other players towards the bottom in overall scores were James Daniels (56.7), Jaylen Warren (56.2), Miles Boykin (55.7), and Allen Robinson (50.1).

Kenny Pickett only had a 58.0 score overall before he left the game but had a 66.6 passing score. Once again, his running score was low based on his scramble where he was injured as well as being credited with the fumble which really wasn’t his. Mitch Trubisky had a much higher score with a 65.8 overall and a 76.7 passing score.

Defense

The top scorer on defense passed my eye test as Keeanu Benton led the way with an 84.5 overall but on only 24 snaps. I felt that Benton was making an impact whenever he was on the field.

Another player who I felt was making a large impact when he was able to be out there was Elandon Roberts (outside of the penalty). But PFF had him towards the bottom of the scores with a 40.6 overall.

The other high scores for the Steelers were Markus Golden (76.6), Isaiahh Loudermilk (74.5), and Cam Heyward (70.2) who all scored above a 70.0 overall. T.J. Watt, Minkah Fitzpatrick, Armon Watts, and Alex Highsmith all ended with grades in the mid 60s. PFF gave the Steelers second sack all to T.J. Watt where the official scorers had it split between Watt and Highsmith.

I was surprised with how many different players had scores in the 40s or lower. Nick Herbig had the bottom score with a 33.0 on his 12 snaps and Mark Robinson somehow managed to get a 36.3 score overall which I actually find quite generous based on how him being on the field completely changed the success of the Cardinals offense. Trenton Thompson didn’t stand out to me in any way, good or bad, on Sunday but had a 40.4 overall score. Others in the 40s included Larry Ogunjobi (48.6), Mykal Walker (46.2), and Damonate Kazee (41.3).

Joey Porter Jr. scored a 62.4 overall with coverage coming in as his bottom score of 59.4. It was a 68.5 run defense and 77.9 tackling score thatput his grade where it was.

Overall

This one was tough for me because of not getting a TV view of the game. I didn’t get the great score for Nate Herbig but I honestly can’t say that he didn’t deserve it. I’m still perplexed at why terrible snaps from the center that creates the ball ending up on the ground gets the quarterback scores dropping and not count for the center. But I’m also very surprised that all but one score on the offense ended up as a 50.0 or higher for a team who could only put up 10 points on one of the worst defenses in the league.

I have a problem with Elandon Roberts having such a low score when him not being on the field completely changed what the defense could do. It was obvious he was missed yet he was scored poorly for what he did? But the biggest problem with the defense on the day was reflected with the score and that was, outside of Keeanu Benton, nobody really stood out in a great way throughout the entire game to make plays when they were needed down the stretch.

My grade of this week’s PFF scores: B-