All eyes on the psyche of the Steelers
How will they bounce back from their loss to the Patriots?
On the most superficial level, the Pittsburgh Steelers face an easy task this weekend.
They will play on Christmas Day at the Houston Texans, who have won four games all season and lost seven of their last eight. Houston lost, 45-7, last week, and the franchise is more focused on whether Bill O’Brien will return as coach next year than their remaining schedule.
The Steelers are an 11-3 power. It should be a walkover.
On a level just below the surface, the Steelers face a stiff challenge not just Monday, but the rest of the season. They must scrape themselves off the floor after their singular, wrenching loss to the New England Patriots, which in Pittsburgh has prompted forensic study, finger-pointing and the need to play at least once without Antonio Brown.
The Steelers must move on after the mostanticipated game of the NFL season turned, for them, into the most difficult to bounce back from. The Steelers were one replay review and a matter of nanoseconds away from securing home-field advantage throughout the playoffs and simultaneously slaying the Patriots, the conference bully whom they had not beaten since 2011.
Now, if they face the Patriots in the playoffs it will likely come in New England, all because the final 30 seconds of their showdown turned into disaster.
Quarterback Ben Roethlisberger is not helping. Immediately after the game Sunday, Roethlisberger threw offensive co-ordinator Todd Haley under the bus, saying he wanted the spike the ball and kick a field goal, but coaches insisted he run a play before he threw his game-losing interception on Pittsburgh’s chaotic final snap.
On Monday, Roethlisberger went on his radio show and doubled down on shifting blame anywhere but on the quarterback who fired a decisive pass over the middle into traffic at the goal-line.
He also continued to relitigate tight end Jesse James’s overturned catch, which was the correct call regarding a bad, confusing rule.
After the Steelers gained 69 yards and moved the ball to the 10-yard line with less than 30 seconds left, Roethlisberger says he wasn’t even trying to call timeout, which officials granted him. Replays, though, show Roethlisberger quite clearly calling the timeout.
“I’m looking to the sideline to coach like, ‘Are we taking this timeout? What are we doing?’ Which is very typical,” Roethlisberger said on Pittsburgh station 93.7 The Fan. “Obviously the only person who can communicate to me is Todd, and so I’m sure he’s asking Coach (Mike) Tomlin and everybody.”
Regarding whether or not the Steelers should have spiked the ball or run a play, Roethlisberger didn’t exactly absolve Haley. He just said he shouldn’t have listened to him.
“At that moment, the only thing I can do is give a receiver a quick hand signal to run a quick route and try and hold the ball long enough because, like I said, the line is not blocking in protection, they’re basically just lining up,” Roethlisberger said.
“And in that moment as I’m thinking in my head ‘Do I spike it? Do I not?’ I went with, and I probably wish I would have listened to my gut now obviously in hindsight, I should have listened to that instead of listening to running a play and I just tried to make a play to Eli. I don’t regret it, I just wish I would had made a better throw. I’ll take the blame for the interception at the end of the game.”
The Steelers probably do not need hyperfocus to beat the lousy Texans, but it can’t be beneficial for their quarterback to be publicly reliving, in supreme detail, the most crushing moments of the season. It would be less alarming if the Steelers didn’t have a track record of playing down to lesser competition.
On the path to 11-3, the Steelers have won by a field goal or less against the Browns, Colts, Bengals and Packers without Aaron Rodgers. That could burn them eventually.
The Steelers will also have to play without Brown, whom Tomlin ruled out for Monday at least.
Brown went to the hospital Sunday to treat a calf injury. ESPN’s Adam Schefter reported Brown will likely return by at least Pittsburgh’s first playoff game. But winning without your best player is always a challenge, no matter the opponent.
The Texans’ game is important, too. If the Steelers slip up in Houston or against winless Cleveland, the Jacksonville Jaguars could catch them and seize the second seed, based on their victory over the Steelers earlier in the season.
The Steelers lost to the Patriots in an unfathomable fashion. They need to make sure it doesn’t cost them again.