Whaley: Arthur Smith ‘Outcoached’ By Chargers

In order to be successful in the NFL, teams need a combination of execution from players and schematics from the coaching staff. Bad game planning can put teams behind the eight ball before they ever step foot on the field. Former NFL GM Doug Whaley believes that is partially to blame for the Pittsburgh Steelers’ poor showing against the Los Angeles Chargers.

“Defensive coordinator [Jesse] Minter had a good game plan, and I think he outcoached Arthur Smith,” Whaley said via The Black & Gold Experience on WPXI after the Steelers’ 25-10 loss. “This game was going to be won in the coaches’ booth, and I think they proved it with what the Chargers’ defense did against the Steelers’ offense.

“I think it was one of the worst games we saw Arthur Smith get outcoached.”

A glance at the box score would back up Whaley’s assertion. Pittsburgh’s offense managed just three points and 156 yards when it mattered before tacking on 65 more yards and seven more points in garbage time.

The Chargers brought a physical, downhill defense to Sunday night’s game, and they trusted their defensive backs to prevent Rodgers’ typical quick-tempo passing game.

Derwin James said it best via the NBC broadcast after the game.

“We know Aaron Rodgers has seen every look in the NFL. It’s hard to trick a guy like that. So we really just wanted to come out, play simple football, and play fast and get to the ball,” James said. “We wanted to challenge ourselves as a secondary to be more physical, to play coverage more tighter, and we did that all week long and we came out and executed today.”

What they were doing wasn’t rocket science. Tomlin said after the Steelers dropped to 5-4 that the Chargers weren’t doing anything unexpected schematically. As much as Whaley wants to paint this as a scheme or coaching issue on Smith, I think he’s missing the point.

Statistically, Rodgers had one of the worst games of his 21-year career. A large part of that (in his own words) was due to his lack of execution. He overthrew a few balls and had trouble navigating the pocket to evade pressure.

“Once Aaron got uncomfortable, he could never kind of get back into that groove. So that’s when Arthur Smith needed to change his game plan and start calling some plays to give Aaron Rodgers confidence, and it just never happened,” Whaley said.

Perhaps at halftime they should have altered the game plan a bit. That’s fair. But they only had three drives in the second half before they suddenly found themselves staring at a three-score deficit. The first drive was four plays, and the second drive was three. They finally put together an eight-play drive that ended with a turnover on downs in the red zone.

If we want to nitpick, Smith’s fourth-down play call reeked of desperation, force-feeding the ball to DK Metcalf in double coverage. But The Steelers were fairly desperate at that point, and people would criticize them just as much if they didn’t target their 6-4, $33 million receiver in that situation.

It wasn’t the game plan that let the ball bounce off Calvin Austin III’s hands for an interception, or overthrow DK Metcalf early for what should have been an easy touchdown. That all comes down to execution.

With this poor of an offensive performance, there is plenty of blame to go around. That includes Smith. But he’s nowhere near the top of the list as Whaley is suggesting.