The Worksheet, a fantasy football overview by Rich Hribar, breaking down everything you need to know for the Week 3 Cincinnati Bengals at Pittsburgh Steelers Sunday afternoon game.
| Cincinnati | Rank | @ | Pittsburgh | Rank |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 3.5 | Spread | -3.5 | ||
| 20.5 | Implied Total | 24 | ||
| 22 | 20 | Points/Gm | 20 | 24 |
| 22 | 12 | Points All./Gm | 21 | 9 |
| 61 | 21 | Plays/Gm | 55.5 | 28 |
| 68 | 26 | Opp. Plays/Gm | 71.5 | 30 |
| 5 | 24 | Off. Yards/Play | 5.3 | 21 |
| 4.5 | 4 | Def. Yards/Play | 5.6 | 14 |
| 45.90% | 9 | Rush% | 31.53% | 29 |
| 54.10% | 24 | Pass% | 68.47% | 4 |
| 41.18% | 17 | Opp. Rush % | 34.97% | 7 |
| 58.82% | 16 | Opp. Pass % | 65.03% | 26 |
- The Steelers are averaging 2.8 yards per rushing play on first downs (30th) after 3.6 yards in 2020 (31st).
- Najee Harris leads all running backs in the share of backfield touches (94.1%), but Pittsburgh also averages the fewest amount of backfield touches per game (17.0) to open the season.
- Harris is averaging 0.50 yards before contact, the second-lowest rate among all backs with 20 or more carries behind Mark Ingram (0.35).
Quarterback
Ben Roethlisberger: Big Ben has picked up where he left off to close last season, opening the year with QB28 (11.5 points) and QB24 (13.8 points) scoring weeks. We are only two games in and there are already whispers of Roethlisberger being unhappy with play calling. He also picked a pec injury last weekend that Mike Tomlin says “will affect his preparation availability” but is not expected to sideline him.
The Bengals gave up points in Week 1 to the Vikings, but they have limited big plays through the passing game through two weeks, allowing 7.2 yards per pass attempt to Kirk Cousins in Week 1 before factoring in the anemic Bears offense last week. The last time these teams played, the Bengals gave the Steelers and Roethlisberger fits, with him passing for just 170 yards and 3.8 yards per attempt. With Ben’s injury and the state of this offense currently, it is hard to treat him as anything but a back-half QB2.
