The Pittsburgh Steelers are off to a 3–0 start for the 2024 season. Winning two games on the road, the Steelers were able to win their home opener last week and are traveling again as they head to Indianapolis to face the Colts. Even as the road team, the Steelers are slight favorites to push their record to 4–0 to start the season for only the fifth time in franchise history.

If Steelers fans are feeling really good about their chances this week, I hate to be the bearer of bad news as I try to give pause to the situation.

I’m just going to say it… The Steelers stink in Week 4.

Looking at the Mike Tomlin era, there are only two weeks out of the season where the Steelers have a losing record dating back to 2007. In Week 14 the Steelers barely squeak under .500 with an 8–9 record giving them a 47.1% win rate. But for Week 4, it’s not even close.

The Steelers are only 5–10 in Week 4 since 2007 with two seasons where they had a bye week. That’s a 33.3% win rate. For some reason, that fourth week of the season just seems to get the Steelers more than at any other time during the season.

But that’s not the end of it.

Sometime it’s that the Steelers have a formidable opponent they are facing and simply lose a game they are expected to lose. But that’s not the case for the majority of the Steelers matchups. Of the 15 games, the Steelers were ponly underdogs three times, all of which they lost. This means that seven of the Steelers losses in Week 4 since 2007 are ones where they were favored. In 2014 the Steelers lost at home to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in the final seconds when they were 7.5-point favorites. In 2007 the Steelers were 5-point road favorites in Arizona and dropped the game. So if you’re worried about a “let-down game,” this is the spot where the Steelers have done it in the past.

To show how much of a let down the Steelers have in Week 4, they have not gone 2–0 in Week 3 and Week 4 of the season since 2004 in the first two starts of Ben Roethlisberger‘s career. Some may point out the Steelers 11–0 start in 2020, but they had the bye week thrust upon them in Week 4 and therefore it does not apply. This means since 2004, when the Steelers have won their game in Week 3, they have lost the following week.

To point out even more discouraging numbers, the Steelers are only 1– 5 on the road in Week 4 under Mike Tomlin. The win came in 2017 when they beat the Baltimore Ravens in Baltimore as 3.5-point road favorites. When favored on the road in Week 4 otherwise, the Steelers have three losses.

I know these numbers are very discouraging. For those that want to look for a reason to criticize the Steelers front office or coaching staff, I’ve probably just given them all kinds of fuel for the fire. Just remember that even though Week 4 has been a typical let-down game for the Steelers, they don’t lose a significantly higher percentage of games in which they are favored than most NFL teams that are successful and are often picked to win the contest. This happens all the time across the NFL where the favored team loses. So thinking that the Steelers are anomaly is simply not looking at the data across the league. But it is strange that the Steelers have a tendency to do this more often in Week 4 than any other week of the season.

Even though there is a significant possibility the Steelers have the potential let-down game on Sunday in Indianapolis, I’m still holding out hope that they will come through against the Colts. It’s not like the Steelers never win in Week 4, and there usually plenty of other factors. For me, this team just feels different than others in the past and I believe they can deliver their fourth victory of the season

But if things don’t go right in Indianapolis, a reasonable explanation is there for the taking.