Killer Penalty

The delay of game penalty really hurt.

 

you could point to a dozen things that hurt them tonight, but the fact is the Ravanes had to go 90 plus yard to beat them and they did.

the defense couldnt come up with a big play on that final drive.

i would say Woodley and Farrior were missed in this game as was Sanders.

no excuses, but they were missing some pretty big pieces tonight.

 

Tomlin said it was due to some last minute personnel changes and having a new holder in there and not watching the clock otherwise he would have called the time out.

 

He would have missed it anyway. The third down swing pass to Moore was the bad call. Stopped the clock and he wouldn't have made it anyway. Why not do what was working for you. Ben to a WR across the middle.

 

The penalty actually worked out OK to give Krapinos 5 more yards to give them time to get down to cover the return. It certainly wasn't the difference in the game. Lot's of fingers to point elsewhere.

 

I have liked the bubble screen just not the way Ben does it but after this game i say throw that page of the play book away. That single turnover was just a killer. You right right though plenty of finger to point at alot of different ppl.

 

The Steelers are just a run of the mill football team this year. Too inconsistent in all phases of the game. With the remaining schedule, they could easily lose more games than they win. If they would make the playoffs, how far would they go anyhow?
The defense is just not there. I am disappointed in Big Ben however, he needs to put teams away more but he just doesn't have it in him , too inconsistent. I was hoping for more from him. Oh well, it could always be worse. :-(

 

Yea it could. We could go back to the long line of worse QBs we had before Ben came along. Sorry but you're just wrong here. Ben leads two successfull scoring drives in the 4th Qtr that puts us in the lead last night with 2 min to play. He did enough unless of course you also expected him to go out and play D as well and maybe sack Flacco on that last drive.

 

Yeah, I actually think it worked in our favor...If Suisham misses they start on the 40 - as it was Kapinos had a great punt and put them on the 10 (I think).

Our inability to stop anything on third down cost us this game-period.

 

Yeah, don't like that swing pass decision either. On top of it Ben seemed to rush the throw when he didn't need to. Not sure he panicked there when he was surprisingly under little pressure for most of the game.

 

I have posted this in other threads, but my real issue is with the two pass plays called on the last series of downs. Baltimore is calling timeouts for every play that the clock continues to run. If we run the ball all three downs, they spend all of their time outs, and get the ball back with 30-40 seconds less time to score. This means 10 yds at a time won't cut it. Whole different last drive. Steelers win.

 

I didn't mind the last drive except for the last incomplete pass to Moore. Not only was it a low percentage pass, but even if he would have caught it his momentum would have carried him out of bounds. Bad first option, bad choice by Ben. The delay of game hurt too, not getting a shot at the FG was ridiculous. But the most heinous of all was playing bump and run coverage against a guy only known for speed with no coverage over the top and only 16 secs left. That was just inexcusable to be up on him like that in press coverage with Clark so far off.

We can easily still get to 11 wins if we handle Cincy and Cleve (4 wins right there) and 2-2 against the others, which if we don't, we don't deserve to go to the playoffs anyways. I still think this team has a lot of potential this season. The O-Line is really starting to gel and the defense is still quite capable. They should get better as the young CBs get more playing time.

 

I would only agree on Sanders and Woodley. I dont think a healthy Farrior would made a bit of difference. I have not seen the numbers but I dont think Rice had a big running game

 

I also wondered why they weren't running the ball, in that situation...

 

...Ben was one of the reasons we had the lead late...and he can only run what is called in from his idiot coordinator unless we are running no huddle...which we weren't. If there is one person this loss should not be pinned to...its Ben. Maybe game 1 vs Ravens...but not last night.