Pittsburgh Steelers: Stock rising/falling after Week 4

The Pittsburgh Steelers started trending up after a win on MNF against Tampa Bay. However, Baltimore quickly rained on that parade beating Pittsburgh at Heinz Field, 26-14, on Sunday night.

The Pittsburgh Steelers started sluggish yet again on Sunday and paid for it. Although they tied the game at 14-all just before halftime, the offense was nonexistent in the second half and the Baltimore offense made a mockery of the Steelers “defense”.

Yes, I put “defense” in quotations because whatever they put out on Sunday was not what I would call defense. As a Steeler fan, I grew up falling in love with their hard-nosed defense and to see it so bad is not fun for me as I am sure is the same for many others.

The team had a couple of players raise their stock in an otherwise market collapsing game. Let’s take a look at how things sit following week 4’s loss.

Bud Dupree – Stock: Up

Bud Dupree was taken in the draft with it known he was a raw edge defender. He has been a tad better than he who shall not be named (okay, okay Jarvis Jones), but overall he has disappointed thus far.

The Steelers swapped T.J. Watt and Dupree’s sides and it seems to have helped both step their game up. Watt exploded week one while Dupree also tallied a sack of his own.

Dupree now sits at three sacks on the year along with his pick-six and a forced fumble. This puts him on pace for 12 sacks in 2018 and while that is not record-breaking, it would be a career high for him.

A season of 12 sacks would have put him in a tie for 8th most in the NFL in 2017. That kind of production is what Pittsburgh envisioned when they took him in 2015.

Dupree can continue to show why Pittsburgh should consider re-signing him after his fifth year option. If the young edge guy can figure it out, he could help this defense build into something a little tougher than melted butter.