Pittsburgh Regular Season Wins: Over 9 (+130) or Under 9 (-150)
Despite having two Super Bowl titles in the past five years, it appears as though the window of opportunity has almost shut on the Steel City. QB Ben Roethlisberger has ruined his reputation with his off-field incidents, (don’t forget about the motorcycle crash without a helmet) and I don’t expect him to be completely 100% focussed mentally on football in 2010. Big Ben has to do so much repair work on his life and public persona that success on the field (which he already has plenty of) will likely take a back seat in 2010.
Odds makers agree to an extent as they have loaded up the juice on the Under with this line and for good reason. The Steelers traded away an emerging WR star in Santonio Holmes and have turned over the 2nd WR spot over to 2nd year pro Mike Wallace who has size and speed but hands of stone. Last year he dropped numerous passes at crucial times in crucial games, so how much faith can the Steelers really have in their passing game? They have an aging and banged up Hines Ward on the other side, and have the immobile object in Byron Leftwich starting the first four (possibly six) games at QB throwing to these guys; that is if he has the time.
The Steelers were 2nd in the league in sacks allowed last year with their atrocious O-Line (50 sacks allowed) and they really haven’t made any improvements to that line in the summer. In fact, they lost Willie Colon for the year to an Achilles injury and he was the one constant on that shaky line. The Pittsburgh QB’s will continue to get dropped this year, WR’s numbers will go down because of it, and more teams will load up the box and take away their running game. Wins will be tough to come by for Pittsburgh.
The Steelers do have a relatively softer schedule though but they do play in one of the toughest division’s in football (two games vs. Cincy, Baltimore and Cleveland) as well as lining up with the improved AFC East with New England, the Jets, Buffalo and Miami. They do have some very winnable games mixed in there against Tampa Bay, Oakland and Carolina, but that is countered by two very tough three game stretches in the season. In Week’s 8-10, Pittsburgh plays @ New Orleans, @ Cincinnati and hosts New England so it is tough to see the Steelers getting any wins in that stretch at all.
Then further down the line in Week’s 13-15 they play @ Baltimore, vs. Cincinnati and vs. New York Jets, so well they get two of those at home, that is during playoff push time and the Steelers will get the A game from all of their opponents.
This aging team may also struggle with injuries down the road as their bye week is during Week 5, so that leaves them with 12 straight weeks of games before the playoffs which is gruelling on the bodies of the players.
Pittsburgh will be lucky to reach .500 this year (8-8) and well many bettors will see the + money on the Over 9 wins and immediately think of the Steelers reputation, they will fail to realize that reputations don’t always accurately represent reality. By taking Under 9 now, you can save yourself a push if by the slim chance they do get to 9 wins, but it is very unlikely they reach 10.
Take Under 9 wins for Pittsburgh this season.
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