Volume, nature of penalties in Week 1 irritate Tomlin
arguments from me regarding calls relevant to that, provided they’re done in real time. I thought they called it off the Jumbotron and I won’t accept that.”
Gay’s was one of four unnecessary roughness penalties called against the Steelers defense in the opener. That not only leads the league, it follows a recent trend by the Steelers for roughing penalties assessed against them.
Last season, they were tied with Baltimore for 11 unnecessary roughness penalties. In 2015, they tied for fourth with 11, and in 2014 they tied for seventh with eight. They have not been out of the top 10 since 2012 when they had only two all season — half as many as they had in this year’s opener.
Does it show a lack of discipline by the Steelers, or is the big-hit mentality merely part of their DNA that goes back decades?
Ryan Shazier’s hit of rookie quarterback DeShone Kizer while he was in his slide after a scramble drew another unnecessary roughness penalty, and T.J. Watt’s late hit on Kizer after he was sacked by Anthony Chickillo also was flagged. J.J. Wilcox drew a fourth unnecessary roughness penalty for a head shot of Corey Coleman as he scored the Browns’ second touchdown.
Wilcox’s was the most brutal and he appeared momentarily to be knocked out. Tomlin said Tuesday that the safety “came in on Monday, expressing concussionlike symptoms. He’s been on protocol ever since.” Shazier said Sunday he thought Kizer’s slide was late as he homed in on the quarterback. “Ryan thought wrong,” Tomlin said, agreeing with that officiating call.
The Steelers lead the league with 144 yards in penalties after one game. The 13 penalties assessed against them are second to Kansas City’s 15.
The franchise record was set in 1977 when they committed 17 penalties against the Baltimore Colts, and their record for penalty yards came against Oakland in 2010 when they had 163.
They ranked sixth in the NFL with 1,068 yards penalized in 2016 and eighth with 113 penalties assessed. Those rankings were much higher than previous years — in 2015 they were 29th (94 penalties) and 23rd (868 yards); in 2014 they were 20th (103) and 24th (834); in 2013 they were 27th (80) and 28th (677).
Nevertheless, they always ranked in the top 10 in those past four seasons in unnecessary roughness penalties.
Tomlin emphasized again Tuesday the negative effect he felt the penalties had on his offense in Cleveland. The Steelers had four holding penalties, which also lead the NFL.
“It kills drives, it kills balance, it reduces the total number of snaps,” Tomlin said. “... we had [54] snaps in the game. So you can have whatever discussion you want to have regarding our lack of production on offense. You can talk it up to Le’Veon [Bell] missing camp, you can talk about them being dominant. You can talk about whatever you want to talk about.
“The reality is when you are penalized like we were in the game, you are going to lose your balance. It’s going to put you behind the chains. Your vessel to lose some third downs. You’re not going to get as many snaps as you’d like, and the point total is going to reflect it, and it did for us.”