Steel City Blitz
Hey Steelers Fans. Welcome to Monday.
For all I know, the Pittsburgh Steelers will rip off six straight wins making losses like yesterday in Chicago a distant memory. They’d finish 12-5 and would win the AFC North and would have a home playoff game. Based on what I’ve seen of this team through 11 games and over the last decade for that matter, there’s no way in Hell this team is winning six in a row. There are too many liabilities on both sides of the ball. The offense is Jekyll and Hyde, often looking solid at some points before returning to this grotesque form that belies logic. The defense is a combination of poor communication wrapped in a cloth of feast or famine play that often determines the team’s fate. This… is our every week Steeler Nation.
In football parlance, that means “middle of the field.” This is something relatively foreign to the Steelers since Ben Roethlisberger retired. Look at the passing charts of recent seasons and you’ll see what I’m talking about. The majority of throws are to the outside, “go balls down the sideline” or are check downs and I don’t consider five-yard gains over the middle to be using the “MoF.” I just don’t get it.
I’m not sure where this team would be without Kenneth Gainwell. He had 128 yards on 16 total touches and you could argue he had two scores. One, he was down near the goal line on the fake “tush push” and then he had a TD called back for holding. Just two weeks after having three total touches he’s become a bigger part of the offense. He and Jaylen Warren are becoming a nice 1-2 punch.
I’m not one to look back on anything from the first half of a game and say, “that was the difference” but it’s difficult in this case. The Steelers were driving in the second quarter with a 14-7 lead. Gainwell ran for what was originally called a first down. ‘Replay Assist’ however kicked in telling the officials that he should have been marked short. Nevermind the fact that Gainwell was yanked to the ground by the facemask which was plain as day to see. That left a fourth and one. The Steelers went with the tush push that was slowed initially but eventually gained three yards. The officials however marked Connor Heyward short giving the ball to the Bears who went down and scored to tie it up. That was at least a 10 or 14 point swing and was 100% the result of bad officiating.
Steelers’ LB Patrick Queen appears to be saying what many of us have been saying all along!
The Raiders are the latest team to prove that firing coordinators during the season is possible in the NFL… Then again, I’m not sure it would help. I think Mike Tomlin’s hands are all...
