Tomlin stands by his controversial calls

PITTSBURGH — Numerous calls by the Pittsburgh Steelers coaching staff left observers scratching their heads. And Steelers fans livid.

Why didn’t coaches call for mountainous QB Ben Roethlisberger to sneak it on a couple of critical failed 4th-and-1 plays?

And why, once they closed Jacksonville’s lead to 42-35 with 2:18 left and two timeouts remaining, didn’t Pittsburgh kick off deep, use the timeouts, get a probably easy stop and force a punt after the two-minute warning? Instead, Tomlin chose to onside-kick it, a terrible effort by Chris Boswell that the Jags easily recovered. Jacksonville kicked a game-sealing field goal four plays later.

As always, head coach Mike Tomlin refused to give his critics a microgram of satisfaction.

On onside-kicking: “We wanted to get the ball back. We hadn’t stopped them convincingly enough to take any other approach, in my opinion, and it was my decision.”

Of not sneaking on the 4th-and-1s: “I felt comfortable with that.”

Roethlisberger was asked why offensive coordinator Todd Haley never had him sneak it.

“I don’t know,” he said. “It’s been a while since we’ve run a quarterback sneak. I’m for it. I don’t know — that’s kind of over my head when it comes to why we don’t do it … I don’t know how many years it’s been since we ran a quarterback sneak.”

— John Kryk