MIAMI GARDENS, Fla. -- Najee Harris faced two rounds of reporters Sunday night at his stall at Hard Rock Stadium following the Steelers' 16-10 loss to the Dolphins. The first was a smaller group which seemed to let the starting running back be a little more real.
"What was the penalty call?" Harris asked reporters, myself included.
The penalty that Harris was referring to was the illegal shift on a crucial third and 1 with just over three minutes to play in the fourth quarter. The call, per referee Scott Novak, was an illegal shift "two players were moving at the same time, did not reset." The rest of the exchange between myself and Harris was confusion over the call. Miles Boykin was the only player in motion (he did not come set).
Here's the exchange Harris and I had over the play:
"There was two people in motion?" Najee asked me, to which I nodded and agreed that Boykin was the only one I saw move.
See for yourself:
I'll get to the significance of this later, the real problem here was the next play. After the 5-yard penalty negated a Kenny Pickett quarterback sneak for a first down, Dan Moore Jr. was called for holding as Pickett scrambled out of the pocket for five yards:
The holding call pushed the Steelers back another 10 yards to third and 16 which resulted in a Pickett interception, one of three on the day for the rookie quarterback:
Mike Tomlin was asked about the above sequence as well. "I didn't get a chance to talk to the officials about the nature of why they called what they called," Tomlin said of the illegal shift call on third and one. "But obviously we got some penalties in critical moments today that set us back."
In fact, the Steelers were only penalized five times for 40 yards on Sunday night, but it was the timing of those five penalties that proved to be the issue. For instance there was another sequence, this one in the third quarter in which James Daniels was called for an ineligible man down field penalty, a five-yarder that negated a 4-yard gain immediately followed by an offensive pass interference call on Diontae Johnson. What would have been a third and 4 -- a manageable situation -- became second and 23 and an eventual punt.
Let's be real here: This Steelers' offense is already stuck in a pretty big tailspin. They're in the bottom five of almost every major offensive category in the NFL through these first seven weeks of the season. Any penalties, let alone flags that come in high-leverage downs, are going to make this uphill climb all the more difficult. But, let's go back to that third and 1 illegal shift.
The penalty was called on Boykin, and while he is a serviceable veteran wide receiver who plays an important role on this team, he's no George Pickens. And do you know who came off the field for Boykin? That's right, the rookie from Georgia went to the sideline on perhaps the biggest play of the game.
Why take your best playmaker off the field in the most important situation of the game? Before I go down that rabbit hole, I'll stop and just point you to DK's column, he'll do a much better job than me of telling you why the lack of Pickens in this offense is inexcusable.
The point here is that these penalties are avoidable. These mistakes are self inflicted. The penalties are not the main reason for the sputtering offense, but they're just one piece to this terrible puzzle. Pickett made a bad throw and a bad decision on third down, but if the penalties don't happen and Matt Canada puts his rookie play caller in a better situation, maybe, just maybe, Pickett doesn't need to force a throw and the offense keeps moving.
Going back to Harris' first postgame scrum, he said it best.
"Penalties. Penalties. Pre-snap penalties," Najee said when asked about what hurt the offense Sunday night. "I think the pre-snap penalties affect us at the wrong time, in the most important parts of the game, in the key moments of the game it affects us. It changes up the play calling. Obviously the penalties are killing us."
They'll have a week back home in Pittsburgh to fix what's killing them. Rest assured, if the starting running back sees it, it's a safe assumption that it's on head coach's radar and will be addressed.
