Welcome to the terrible take and many podcasts telling Steelers Nation what's on our mind.

I'm Josh Carney.

Well, this stinks.

That was my reaction when the 2024 schedule for the Pittsburgh Steelers came out and I saw the week 11 through 18 stretch,

which is an absolute gauntlet featuring all six AFC North match-ups, a road trip to Philadelphia, and, oh by the way, a Christmas day

matchup against the Kansas City Chiefs.

It was well known coming into the schedule release that the Steelers were going to have a tough

schedule based on strength to schedule metrics.

But I didn't know that it would be that tough.

The NFL, they did them no favors, period.

If you're an optimist, getting that brutal stretch late in the season is perfect because it allows the Steelers a team with a bunch of new faces and needing to learn a new offensive scheme, plenty of time to gel.

My rebuttal to that, it's the same for all the other teams too.

There is no advantage there.

Every other team gets plenty of time to work out the kinks early in the season before that stretch of games.

Another optimistic reason I've heard and read is that the brutal stretch could come at a time where the

rest of the AFC north is banged up, especially at quarterback like it was last year.

Again, it could be the same for the Steelers.

Pittsburgh won't be healthy heading into that gauntlet. I'm a most guaranteed of that. There is no real

positive takeaway from that stretch of games. Call me a pessimist and again I've been called

much worse. But on paper, that stretch is absolutely brutal.

No two ways around it. All six division games in an eight week span.

Two Baltimore match-ups leading into short weeks, a Christmas day game against

...