Steelers Insider: Roethlisberger talks two-point conversions, red zone improvement

Heading into the 2015 season, teams were converting two-point conversions at roughly a 50 percent success rate (47.8 to be exact, and the data, culled by Yahoo Sports, went back five previous seasons).

Roethlisberger told reporters on Tuesday that he wants to see the team vie for two points following every trip into the end zone for the upcoming season. Furthermore, he has discussed it already with head coach Mike Tomlin. Steelers quarterback Ben Roethlisberger thinks those numbers should increase in 2016, according to ESPN’s Jeremy Fowler. “Put the ball in our hands”. Any player would relish that opportunity.

Steelers season never truly ends for Steeler Nation so while the team starts to put in the work to prepare for the 2016 National Football League season we’ll be busy looking for mentions of your Black & Gold so we’ve got you covered.

If Roethlisberger has his way – and apparently Tomlin as well – the Steelers will go for two more often in 2016. If he has it his way, the Steelers will attempt a two-point conversion after every single touchdown.

The drill mimics a 2-point conversion situation, but Roethlisberger says it can provide benefit in other aspects, too.

The average two-point conversion was worth about 0.027 points per try more than the average extra point during the first season of the longer kick.

The Steelers had a lot of success with two-point conversions last season. Considering they went 8 for 11 last year and 4 for 4 the year before, and they have Roethlisberger, Le’Veon Bell, Antonio Brown and an excellent offensive line, that seems reasonable.

The Steelers pick seven plays before every game that they favor and can run from the two-yard line for two-point attempts come game time.

“Coach Tomlin brought it up to me, it was previous year”, Roethlisberger said, “We had a game plan going into every game”.

Everything here points toward going for two on every try being a positive expected value proposition for the Steelers. Seventy-two percent of the time the Steelers did that a year ago, they found themselves in the end zone on back-to-back snaps.