Football Footnotes: Joey Porter Jr. on coverage plan for CeeDee Lamb; Dallas' scheme to pressure Justin Fields

For as much as the Pittsburgh Steelers and Dallas Cowboys are known commodities across the NFL, the injuries both teams have endured early in 2024 are casting a bit of mystery over Sunday night’s matchup between the clubs.

In this week’s “Football Footnotes,” we look at some of the matchups in the game that have taken a few twists as this week has gone along.

As a team, the Cowboys only have eight sacks in four games, 20th in the NFL entering this week’s action. With pass rusher DeMarcus Lawrence on injured reserve (foot), and Micah Parsons likely out for this game (ankle), the Cowboys are losing a huge chunk of what little pass rush they may have. Those two players have combined for four of Dallas’ sacks.

Mainly, that is good news for the Steelers — particularly for quarterback Justin Fields, and for the two tackles (Dan Moore Jr. and Broderick Jones) who would’ve had to block those guys.

But it also creates an element of the unknown. How will Dallas defensive coordinator Mike Zimmer try to create pressure in other ways with Parsons and Lawrence out of action?

Based on Mike Tomlin’s explanation, Zimmer won’texactly be out of his depth just because his top edge guys could both be on the shelf.

“He’s one of the godfathers of double-A (gap) pressure in one-dimensional passing moments,” head coach Mike Tomlin said Tuesday. “We better prepare ourselves for multiple blitz looks. I’d imagine that he’s going to have all the schematic tools at his disposal in terms of creating pressure on the quarterback, particularly, with maybe his edge guys out.”

When he was working at ESPN, former NFL coach Jon Gruden posted a good breakdown of Zimmer’s double-A gap attack from his days as head coach in Minnesota. It often features two linebackers on either side of the center, showing blitz — but not always coming.

That could put a lot of physical and mental strain on rookie center Zach Frazier, left guard Isaac Seumalo (likely making his first start of the year), and whoever is playing right guard (rookie Mason McCormick, or second-year reserve Spencer Anderson).

“This is the NFL,” McCormick said Monday. “You can say what you want about who is out and who is in. If you aren’t ready to roll, you are going to get run around.”

Dallas receiver Brandin Cooks is also out with a knee infection. That’s not devastating news for the Cowboys from a production standpoint. He has just nine catches for 91 yards in four games.

But it does create some uncertainty for how the other wide receivers on Dallas’ roster may line up for quarterback Dak Prescott. By extension, that also brings into question how Tomlin and defensive coordinator Teryl Austin deploy their cornerbacks.

Most notably, how often will Joey Porter Jr. cover star pass catcher CeeDee Lamb? Will he do so even when Lamb goes into the slot? Will Lamb leave the slot more and go outside now that Cooks is out?

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According to ProFootballFoucs.com, over four games Cooks was in the slot 40 times on passing downs. That’s about a quarter of his snaps when the ball is thrown. Roughly the other 75% of the time he was outside. Lamb has had 88 passing reps from the slot (56.4%), and 61 out wide (39%).

PFF tracks KaVontae Turpin as having 42 of 49 game reps from the slot. Jalen Tolbert has been outside 134 times and in the slot 67 times. Jalen Brooks has had 52 snaps wide and nine from the slot.

So maybe Lamb’s fate is determined by whether head coach Mike McCarthy wants Brooks on the field as an outside guy more often with Lamb on the inside, or if he’d rather have Turpin in the slot frequently with Lamb logging most of his time outside.

If McCarthy is making his decision at all based on trying to draw Porter into the slot where he might be less familiar, it might be a moot point. Austin was asked on Thursday if Porter was “in his ear” for a full-time shadow assignment on Lamb even when Lamb goes inside.

“Idon’t think so this week,” Austin said of that strategy. “He may have been in our ear. We’ll find out on Sunday.”

Porter — who has usually been publicly declarative mid-week when he knows if he’ll be shadowing a specific receiver — seemed unsure as of Thursday.

“Idon’t know if I’ll be traveling in the slot or not,” Porter said. “We know (Lamb) likes to move around a lot. Our whole goal is trying to minimize him getting the ball. Whatever that is by gameday, we will try to do it to the best of our ability. He and Dak have had a good tandem going on for a while now. They are definitely our main objective.”

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When it comes to the Steelers’ injuries, they will play a role as well — especially along the offensive line.

Not only will the interior three be tested by Zimmer’s blitz schemes, butthe Steelers’ line has to do a better job opening bigger holes in the run game.

The Steelers are tied with Baltimore and New Orleans for the most rushing attempts in the NFL with 138. As a team, though, the Steelers average an underwhelming 3.7 yards per rush. Only four teams have a lower average.

Keep in mind that a fair number of those yards are coming from Justin Fields’ scrambling ability.

Not only that, but ball carriers for the Steelers are averaging a meager 1.7 yards before contact. The New York Jets (1.6) and Giants (1.5) are the lone teams worse in the NFL. Playing without Troy Fautanu, Seumalo and now James Daniels has been part of that inefficiency.

“As we get going in this thing, and as you are mix-and-matching O-linemen, there’s a rhythm tothe run game,” coordinator Arthur Smith said Thursday.“In the Chargers game (Week 3), you could see them in sync. That’s something that we’re continuing to work through just like you do every year. We need to be cleaner, definitely, earlier in the game.”

Hopefully, that can happen against the Cowboys. Dallas’ rush defense yields 145.8 yards per game on the ground. That’s 26th in the NFL.