By 8 p.m. eastern tonight the Steeler Face cracked open an icy cold
Iron City brew and switched the setting on his anxiety chamber from
"St. Louis Cardinals" to "Pittsburgh Steelers." (As many of
you know, the Steeler Face is as much of a fan of the St. Louis baseball
Cardinals as he is of our beloved Steelers. And if you didn't know that--now
you do). At any rate, one may wonder how can "playoff anxiety"
possibly compare to a "regular season game against a 1-4 team" anxiety? Well, you would only wonder that if you haven't watched the Steelers play
this year.
While my Cardinals missed an opportunity to close out the NLDS
and move on to the NLCS by dropping a 2-1 decision to the Washington Nationals
-- I actually had more confidence that they would win than I did in the
Steelers ability to beat a team, any team, on the road this year.
However, my early afternoon was frustrated by watching Jim Joyce call
balls that landed anywhere between the Pacific and
Atlantic Ocean "strikes". Seriously, is Joyce the worst
umpire, or the worst umpire EVER?! (By the way, be careful about posing
that question to Tigers fans). While Joyce offered a wide strike zone no
matter what team was batting, I couldn't help but feel it hurt the hot hitting
team with the better plate discipline a little more . . . and now I was left to
ponder the Steelers.
Steeler Face correspondents from the Michigan Bureau, Pat and
Heather were dispatched to Pittsburgh for the express purpose of watching this
game at a Steeler bar (which is any bar) in Pittsburgh. Pat and Heather
are undefeated (or, were undefeated) when they have watched the Steelers
play in Pittsburgh.
There were a few bright spots . . .
-- Early in the first quarter, I exclaimed: "Holy sh!t --
I think that was James Harrison on TV" when I saw a Steeler jersey with a
number 92 on it sack Matt Hasselbeck with the Titans on the Steelers goal line.
Tennessee had to settle for a field goal that hit the upright and still
bouced in for a 3-0 Titans lead.
-- Chris Rainey had a long kick off return . . . and no penalty flag
was thrown to negate it. Rainey had two kick returns for touchdowns
called back in one quarter in a preseason game this year. "No flag?" I said,
"seriously, something must be wrong with my TV." And
then, on the first play from scrimmage, the Steelers starting center,
Maurkice Pouncey went down with an injury. "Yep. The TV set
was functioning properly after all. Damnit."
-- Mike Wallace hauled in a 82-yard TD reception from Big Ben
to put the Steelers up 10-3 in the first quarter.
-- Lawrence Timmons had a couple of monster tackles and an
interception. Larry Foote and Jason Worilds each had a sack too.
-- Isaac Redman caught four passes for 105 yards. It was
the first time a Steeler running back had over 100 yards receiving since John
"Frenchy" Fuqua did it in 1970. Moreover, Redman actually
seemed effective (in relief of Rashard Mendenhall who left the game with
. . . wait for it . . . . wait for it . . . if you guessed "an
injury" . . . you are correct! For your reward, take two alka
seltzers and call off work tomorrow!).
-- Heath Miller caught 6 passes for 67 yards and moved into third
on the Steelers all-time receptions list. (HInes Ward tops that list with
1,000 catches for Pittsburgh). By the way, it seemed that each of
Miller's receptions were "big time" grabs that gave the Steelers a
first down.
-- Big Ben completed 24 of 40 passes for 363 yards, 1 TD and 1
INT. He also also had a 14-yard run. For the season Ben has 10 TDs
and only 2 INTs. Oh, and he passed some guy named Terry Bradshaw for
first place on the Steelers all time passing yardage list with 28,066 yards.
That Terry guy had 27,989.
-- Shawn Suisham kicked 3 field goals (including a 52-yarder
tying a career high). Suisham hasn't missed a field goal attempt all year
-- except for the last one he tried tonight -- a 54-yarder.
And then, there was the rest of the game . . .
--Antonio Brown dropped a pass on 3rd down. The
subsequent punt attempt was blocked, and recovered by the Titans near the goal line
to end the first quarter. At this point I wondered aloud,
"Haven't I suffered enough already today?" I guess not. Two
plays later Tennessee scored a touchdown to take a 13-10 lead.
-- Marcus Gilbert left the game with an injury. For those
of you playing the at home version of "Just how bad are things for the
Steelers?" -- that was the second starting offensive lineman forced to leave
the game due to injury in just the first half. Not surprisingly, that
drive ended with Roethlisberger getting sacked.
-- After completing a 55-yard pass to Isaac Redman that gave the
Steelers a first down at the Titans 32 with 1:38 to go before halftime, Big Ben took this opportunity to throw only his second interception of
the season. Tennessee easily moved downfield (against the Steelers sh!tty
defense of course) and kicked another field goal for a 16-10 halftime lead.
-- Combined, the Steelers rushed 22 times for 56 yards -- for the game. (Now .
. . ready . . . set . . . VOMIT!).
-- Mendenhall (who just came back from injury) left the game
with an achilles injury (in case you missed that reference in the "good
news" section earlier).
--Redman, who was having a productive game in place of the
injured Mendenhall, took a helmet to the knee after a 5-yard run late in the third quarter --
and didn't return. By the way, I had picked up Redman at the beginning of
the season for my fantasy team, thinking he had potential for a big year. I
dumped him when he didn't pan out, and after Mendenhall came back. Then I
picked him up again in the middle of this game, when he showed for the first
time, in a long time, that he could be effective.
When
things got really interesting
. . . and then heartbreaking
Timmons picked off Hasselbeck in the fourth quarter near
midfield, yielding a gratuitous rendition of Renegade. Of course, the
Steelers did't convert the turnover into a touchdown, but Suisham did make a
career long 52-yard field goal to put the Steelers up 23-16.
In
response, Hasselbeck was able to take his
team right down field. Although, Kenny Britt dropped two TD passes, he
held on to a third one, and the game was tied 23-23 with 4:19 to go.
Big Ben moved the Steelers down to the Titans 35 yard line, and
then on second down and facing a Titans blitz, Pittsburgh announced over the
stadium's public address system, and on their Twitter account that they were
going to do a lame a$$ run with Rainey up the middle. Upon hearing the
announcement and reading the Tweet, Tennessee stuffed him for a 2-yard loss. And
then on fourth down, while Pat J. was screaming at the top of his lungs all the way from Pittsburgh: "punt! punt! punt! for the love of all that is lovable, please
oh please just f@cking punt!" -- the Steelers attempted a 54 yard field
goal that fell just 1 yard short.
Taking possession at midfield the Titans were then able to
easily maneuver about 30+ yards to kick as easy-peezy 40-yard field goal as
time expired to win 26-23. This was the third consecutive game decided by
a field goal as time expired for Pittsburgh.
The Steelers are now 2-3 overall and 0-3 on the road.
Pittsburgh will have 10 days to think about this one before they travel
to Cincinnati where the Bungles will no doubt embarrass them on national
television in a Sunday night contest. I hate to say this, but even though
I live in Cincy, I'm not going out to see this one.
The
Steeler Face is now 1-4 in game predictions on the year and 11-10 overall, all
time.
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