Take this with all the grains of salt you have. But after posting the most accurate mock draft and nailing Super Bowl after Super Bowl prediction, Good Morning Football’s Peter Schrager is setting his sights on a new task. Predicting the NFL schedule. Due to be released next Wednesday, he believes the Pittsburgh Steelers will open the season hosting the New York Giants at home in a primetime, Monday night slot.
Schrager is an insider who hears from teams but it’s difficult to say if he’s leaning on sourced information or if he’s just gathering his own thoughts and insights. It’s certainly a prediction and not reporting.
But assuming it comes true, it’ll resemble the way Pittsburgh opened up in 2020. The only difference is the Steelers were the road team for that game, the first they played in the pandemic in front of a completely empty stadium. Pittsburgh came out on top with a 26-16 victory. QB Ben Roethlisberger fired three touchdowns, while RB Benny Snell rushed for 113 yards. Defensively, the Steelers picked off Giants QB Daniel Jones twice and sacked him three times. DL Cam Heyward picked off one of those passes, the first interception of his career.
The worst part of the game was starting RT Zach Banner suffering a season-ending knee injury that spelled the beginning of the end of his Steelers’ career.
The Giants are coming off a 6-11 2023 season with plenty of uncertainty on their roster. Jones suffered a season-ending ACL tear in November, leaving his Week One availability in question. If he’s unable to go, Drew Lock would get the nod. There’s also a new backfield led by Devin Singletary after Saquon Barkley signed with the Philadelphia Eagles. The Giants beefed up their defensive line by trading for Carolina Panthers DE Brian Burns, who has posted 20.5 sacks over the past two combined seasons.
Pittsburgh is hoping to open another season at home. From 2015 to 2022, the Steelers began every season on the road before that streak finally halted in 2023 when the team hosted the San Francisco 49ers. But the Pittsburgh Pirates’ homestand might push the team to play on the road, meaning that part of Schrager’s prediction probably won’t come true. It seems plausible the team could begin the year on the road against the Denver Broncos, setting up QB Russell Wilson to face his former team.
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