{"id":14591,"date":"2026-05-14T03:31:36","date_gmt":"2026-05-14T03:31:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/france\/14591\/"},"modified":"2026-05-14T03:31:36","modified_gmt":"2026-05-14T03:31:36","slug":"chirs-simms-steelers-saints-in-france-looks-like-most-underwhelming-2026-international-nfl-game","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/france\/14591\/","title":{"rendered":"Chirs Simms: Steelers-Saints In France Looks Like ‘Most Underwhelming’ 2026 International NFL Game"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Pittsburgh Steelers made history last year by playing in the NFL\u2019s first regular-season game in Ireland. They\u2019ll be in a similar situation this year, too, set to face the New Orleans Saints in the league\u2019s first game in France.<\/a> While it\u2019s an exciting occasion, Chris Simms thinks it falls flat compared to the rest of the NFL\u2019s 2026 international slate.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think this is the greatest international slate of games we\u2019ve ever put out there,\u201d Simms said Wednesday on his Unbuttoned podcast.<\/a> \u201cRivalry to start the year? Rams-49ers, [Kyle] Shanahan\u2019s pissed that the Rams have been begging to make the 49ers play one of these international games\u2026 Ravens and Cowboys in Brazil? I\u2019d be shocked if there aren\u2019t fireworks in that football game.<\/p>\n

\u201cEven Colts-Commanders, and the Colts and what they can be, and Jayden Daniels, I\u2019m expecting healthy, awesome Jayden Daniels again. The two games with the Jaguars, the Eagles and the Texans are coming? That\u2019s awesome. Both of those games, two weeks in a row in London, are going to be great. I know they had to do the Fleur-de-Lis in Paris, so you\u2019ve got Pittsburgh coming to town. That, to me, is probably the most underwhelming matchup of all of these right here.\u201d<\/p>\n

On paper, Steelers-Saints doesn\u2019t look like an all-star matchup. It\u2019s May, and the Steelers still don\u2019t even know who their starting quarterback will be this season. Meanwhile, the Saints went 6-11 last year and finished last in the NFC South.<\/p>\n

There aren\u2019t a lot of people projecting either team to<\/a> go far in 2026, even if the Steelers re-sign Aaron Rodgers. However, this game won\u2019t be played until Week 7 at the end of October. There\u2019s a lot of time between now and then.<\/p>\n

Perhaps the Steelers and Saints will surpass people\u2019s expectations to start the year. Even if neither of them looks like Super Bowl contenders at that point, they could still give Paris an exciting game. The Steelers managed to have a fun matchup with<\/a> the Minnesota Vikings in Ireland last year.<\/p>\n

Also, some of those other international games could end up falling flat. Injuries happen, and sometimes, teams disappoint. Look at the Baltimore Ravens last year. They entered the season as Super Bowl contenders but they didn\u2019t even make the playoffs.<\/p>\n

There are some fun storylines for Steelers-Saints, too. For example, Saints head coach Kellen Moore was the Dallas Cowboys\u2019 offensive coordinator for the first three years of Mike McCarthy\u2019s tenure as head coach there. While there is no indication of\u00a0bad blood between Moore and McCarthy, it should still be interesting to see them duke it out as equals.<\/p>\n

Maybe Simms will be correct, and the Saints and Steelers will struggle to give Paris a show. However, it\u2019s a little early to completely write that game off. It could\u2019ve been much worse, too. Rumors suggested that the Cleveland Browns were going to be the Saints\u2019 opponent in France. No matter what you think of the Steelers, they look like they\u2019re going to be more exciting than the Browns.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Pittsburgh Steelers made history last year by playing in the NFL\u2019s first regular-season game in Ireland. They\u2019ll…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":14592,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[11214,11215,5,10589,10590],"class_list":{"0":"post-14591","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-france","8":"tag-chris-simms","9":"tag-chris-simms-unbuttoned","10":"tag-france","11":"tag-new-orleans-saints","12":"tag-pittsburgh-steelers"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14591","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14591"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14591\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14592"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14591"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14591"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/france\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14591"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}