Great hope remained for the 2024 Steelers as the calendar flipped to 2025. A playoff berth long clinched after a 10-3 start, hopes for a division title endured into the regular season’s final weekend.
Instead, the Steelers dropped their Jan. 4 finale to Cincinnati, and a week later they fell to Baltimore for the second time in 22 days. The latter loss was the Steelers’ fifth straight and pushed the Steelers’ postseason losing streak to six.
If the playoff-win drought extends to a full decade will be decided over the first 12 days of 2026. The Steelers must beat the Ravens on Sunday to qualify for the postseason for the fifth time in six seasons. In conjunction would come their first AFC North title since 2020, setting up a playoff opener at home.
The route to this point of the 2025 season was anything but linear.
The Steelers spent the spring without a starting quarterback after allowing Russell Wilson and Justin Fields to depart. As rumors swirled amid will-he-or-won’t-he chatter, Aaron Rodgers finally joined the Steelers in June. Rodgers, now 42, has shown flashes of his former four-time NFL MVP self. While his limitations are evident in his 21st season, Rodgers has largely not held the team back.
The flaws on the roster moreso lie on defense and at wide receiver, the latter spot made worse after DK Metcalf was suspended last week. The May trade of former WR1 George Pickens exacerbated the problem — and it stings more after Pickens’ star turn with Dallas.
That deal and the trade for (and signing of) Metcalf in March were the splashiest moves of the offseason until the June blockbuster trade of Minkah Fitzpatrick for fellow three-time All Pro defensive back Jalen Ramsey and reigning Pro Bowl tight end Jonnu Smith.
Ramsey and cornerback Joey Porter Jr. have held the secondary together while a dizzying parade of veterans has come (and, in some cases, gone): Darius Slay, Brandin Echols, Juan Thornhill, Chuck Clark, Jabrill Peppers, Kyle Dugger, Asante Samuel Jr. and Tre Flowers.
First-round rookie defensive tackle Derrick Harmon joins Porter and a trio of second-year offensive linemen (Zach Frazier, Mason McCormick and Troy Fautanu) among bright spots for this season’s Steelers.
As the 2025 Steelers prepare for a win-and-advance game against Baltimore, they’ll do so with nine starters gone from the 2024 Steelers’ win-and-advance game against Baltimore 51 weeks prior.
Through all the changes, these Steelers look a lot like many of the franchise’s other recent teams. They’re over. 500 — but barely so. They’re on the verge of a playoff spot — but not with the look of a team poised to make a run.
The hamster wheel-like feeling has rankled swaths of the fanbase, some of whom chanted “Fire Tomlin” and booed “Renegade” during a disheartening Nov. 30 loss to Buffalo.
A poor showing Sunday would no doubt produce a similar disheartening scene.
But a pair of wins these next two weekends? That would represent meaningful progress.