The Pittsburgh Steelers look for preseason win no .2 as they face the Jacksonville Jaguars at the TIAA Bank Field on Saturday night.
Pittsburgh defeated the Seattle Seahawks 32-25 in their first preseason game with rookie Kenny Pickett throwing the game-winning touchdown. Meanwhile, the Jaguars dropped to 0-2 SU in the current preseason after losing 24-13 to the Cleveland Guardians last weekend. The Jaguars also lost to the Las Vegas Raiders 27-11 in the Hall of Fame game last Thursday.
Pittsburgh had an up and down 2021 but ended up making the postseason after finishing with a 9-7-1 record and ending up in second place in the AFC North. They came up short against the Kansas City Chiefs 42-21 in the wild card game.
The Steelers are on a high after winning their preseason opener. Pittsburgh opened with a 14-0 first quarter against Seattle and never looked back. Rookie Kenny Pickett was impressive in his Steelers debut as he completed 13 of 15 passes for 95 yards with two touchdowns. Pickett is competing for the starting QB job versus veterans Mitch Trubisky and Mason Rudolph and that competition could be helpful for the Steelers here.
Anthony McFarland rushed for 56 yards on seven carries while their quarterbacks spread the wealth well with 12 different receivers catching a pass last weekend. On defense, the Steelers have a front 3 of Cameron Heyward, Larry Ogunjobi, and Tyson Alualu but the three aren’t expected to play significant minutes on Saturday. Myles Jack, Devin Bush, and T.J. Watt lead a strong linebacker unit while Minkah Fitzpatrick and Terrell Edmonds lead a very strong secondary.
Jacksonville’s 2021 was so bad it’s not even worth talking about. The Jaguars have already played twice this preseason and have lost twice. They have looked bad in both games, especially offensively. Jacksonville scored only 11 points against the Raiders during the Hall of Fame game. Last week, they put up only 13 points against a Cleveland defense that was missing at least five starters.
Trevor Lawrence was 6-12 for 95 yards with one touchdown last weekend. Meanwhile, Jake Luton went 12-21 with 92 yards but had zero TDs and one interception. Jacksonville took the lead early on and was only down by one point at the half. However, they did not score the rest of the way and lost to the Browns.
Coach Pederson hopes that Lawrence will have a better year this season after throwing 17 picks during his rookie year in 2021. The Jaguars upgraded at TE and WR positions. Lawrence will have Marvin Jones Jr. back along with Zay Jones and Christian Kirk as his main passing targets along with Evan Engram. Meanwhile, the Jacksonville defense is still a work in progress, and with players competing for positions, they won’t look pretty once again.
Head to head, Pittsburgh is 4-2 SU in the last six games played between these two teams. The Steelers are also 4-1 SU in their last five games played in Jacksonville.
Pittsburgh Steelers SU betting trends:
Jacksonville Jaguars SU betting trends:
The Steelers have three QBs who could make a case as their Week 1 starter. Pittsburgh could put in Mitch Trubisky, Mason Rudolph, or rookie Kenny Pickett and the team’s offense is just going to be fine. Both Trubisky and Rudolph are proven commodities while Pickett showed great promise last week. With Jacksonville allowing more than 25 points through two games played, I think the Steelers’ offense will do well in this game.
Pittsburgh’s weakness in Week 1 was its defense which allowed 339 yards of offense against the Seahawks. However, the Steelers have a strong secondary and an excellent linebacker corps. The Pittsburgh front seven is very good against the run and if the Jaguars cannot establish their rushing attack here, Lawrence will be forced to throw more passes than he should.
The Jaguars should be able to hang around when Lawrence is still on the field. But once he gets his rest, I don’t think that the Jacksonville offense can keep up with the Steelers. Give me the Steelers to pull off the betting upset here.
Prediction: Pittsburgh Steelers +165
Steelers are 6-13-1 ATS in their last 20 games played against the Jaguars and the underdog is 10-2-1 ATS in the last 13 games played between these two teams. However, Pittsburgh is 3-0-1 in their last four road games against Jacksonville. The road team is also 6-0-1 ATS in the last seven head-to-head meetings between these two teams.
Pittsburgh Steelers ATS trends:
Jacksonville Jaguars ATS trends:
The Steelers have won two out of the last three head-to-head meetings between these two teams and have outscored the Jaguars by 8.33 points per game during that span. Over their last 10 head-to-head meetings, Pittsburgh has also outscored Jacksonville by an average of 3.0 points per game.
There’s no question that the Steelers have the better team on paper and with both Trubisky and rookie Pickett coming off very good debuts, I expect the Steelers offense to produce more points than the Jaguars who aren’t going to play Trevor Lawrence too long in this one too.
Pittsburgh produced 409 yards of offense last week and had 24 first downs with zero turnovers. The Steelers averaged 6.1 yards of offense per play and were only called for two penalties. Meanwhile, the Jaguars went on a drought after a solid first half. They had 21 first downs but were only 3-13 on third down attempts while committing three turnovers.
Based on what I’ve seen so far, I’m not sure why Pittsburgh isn’t the favorite here. They were consistent last weekend, scoring in each quarter of their game against the Seahawks. Give me the Steelers to win outright. I’ll take the plus points for good measure.
Prediction: Steelers +3.5
The total has gone under in five out of the last six meetings between these two teams. The under is also 5-1 in their last six meetings in Jacksonville.
Pittsburgh Steelers over/under trends:
Jacksonville Jaguars over/under trends:
Jacksonville’s defense is far from being elite. The Jaguars have conceded 51 points in two games played so far. Given the quarterback situation in Pittsburgh, it won’t be a surprise to see their three quarterbacks suiting up in this game, which means we’ll see a sustained offense from Pittsburgh all-game long.
Meanwhile, the Pittsburgh defense wasn’t up to par last week and although I expect them to do a better job here, their main guys won’t be staying too long in this game, which should lead to some points for the Jaguars. Trevor Lawrence could also see more action here and that should give Jacksonville more scoring opportunities.
I think we’ll have a good scoring first half with the teams slowing down a bit in the second half. However, both offenses should rule over the defenses, allowing these teams to score more points while pushing the total to over 43 points.
Prediction: Over 43
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