Michael Pittman — Week 1: Three for Three, and the Longest Play
2026 NFL Season · Half-PPR Scoring · Monday, Sep 14
Pittman caught all three throws sent his way Sunday — twenty-one yards short left on second and four in the first quarter, twenty-eight yards deep left in the third, the longest play from scrimmage for either team, and nine in the closing drive — for fifty-eight yards and plus three point four expected points, second on the Steelers. DK Metcalf had ten targets to his three in a 20–13 win over the Falcons.
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The longest play from scrimmage either team ran Sunday was a Michael Pittman catch. First and 10 at the Pittsburgh 20, six 43 left in the third quarter, Steelers up 13 to seven: Aaron Rodgers deep left, 19 yards in the air, Pittman pushed out of bounds at the 48 for 28. +2.0 expected points added — expected points added is what a play was worth given down, distance and field position — and the third-largest positive number on any Steelers snap that counted, behind Pat Freiermuth's touchdown and Roman Wilson's 20-yard catch on third and 15. The next thing that happened was a false start on Pittman at six oh four, five yards, no play, and the drive that had started with his 28 ended a few snaps later on the fourth-and-three incompletion to DK Metcalf.
The line is short and clean: three targets, three catches, 58 yards, no touchdowns, +3.4 on the three. The first was second and four at the Atlanta 47 with 10 18 left in the first, short left, six yards in the air and 21 gained, to the 26 on the drive that produced Chris Boswell's first field goal — +1.5 and seven and a half points of win probability, the share of games a team in that situation goes on to win. The third was second and 12 at the Pittsburgh 20 with two 47 left in the game, short left for nine, which set up the third-and-three throw to Darnell Washington that let Pittsburgh kneel it out. One target before halftime, two after.
Three targets on 40 Rodgers throws is a small share. Metcalf had 10, Jaylen Warren and Roman Wilson six each, Rico Dowdle and Pat Freiermuth five, Pittman three, Washington two. But the expected points tell a different story from the target counts: Freiermuth's five targets were worth +3.7 and Pittman's three were worth +3.4, and the eight throws between them produced a hundred four yards and the touchdown, while Metcalf's 10 produced 40 yards and −5.4. Pittman's 28-yarder was longer than anything Metcalf caught by 14 yards.
Back in June the preview called Pittman a proven volume receiver on a new team with a 42-year-old quarterback, and the open question was how the role translated alongside Metcalf. The first answer is that the volume went to Metcalf and the efficiency went to Pittman, three for three and nothing shorter than nine yards. Three targets is too few to call a role, and one game is too few to call anything; what it showed is that the throws he did get were the ones that moved the ball. Pittsburgh is at the Patriots on Sunday the twentieth. Watch whether three becomes six.
_Data via nflverse._
When Michael Pittman's week moves the numbers, you'll know — every episode, in one weekly email.
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