Your 2016 Pittsburgh Steelers (Playoff Edition)

[slam]

Kidnap Saban's family then back up the Brinks truck to get him to stay.

My guess is that Saban would just kill his own family like Kaiser Soze.

I have a theory that the Patriots could literally reuse a 2004 Charlie Weis offensive gameplan and beat the 2017 Steelers. They haven't evolved much at all.

 

[102 Pat]

Bingo. My guess is, if you were to list all of the NFL head coaches (who all already have jobs and aren't available for hire, mind you), there wouldn't be many that you'd personally consider good.

It's a credit really to just how phenomenal of a coaching staff that New England has. I think your fanbase (and I say this respectfully) has somewhat lost perspective on how good you guys have it -- BB coaching talents are once-in-a-lifetime, and you can't just go out there and grab one off the street. I personally think Tomlin is a good, not great, coach, and is part of a good coaching staff. They're just not on New England's level...but then no one is.

So much of the fanbase is spoiled and if the Pats don't win every game 45-7 it's gloom and doom. You can come to this board the day after a win and one would think they lost the game...

 

[Nikolai]

Very classy post. I wish all Steeler fans were like you. See you next year, bud.

Agreed.

This morning, I'm getting a cavalcade of excuses from Steeler fans I know, focusing in on the refs. Dude, it was a 27-point game with 5 minutes left.

Anyway, I think @lillloyd got it exactly right. The Steelers have undeniable talent, but lack depth and have some holes to patch in. And they may have to deal with their QB situation sometime soon, even if they got a decent enough (but definitely not great) performance last night.

 

[Froob]

Just stopping back in to say congrats on the victory.

Thoughts on the game:

Defensively for Pitt, what can you say? New England's coaching staff is the best in the league at putting a laser focus on a team's defensive vulnerabilities. Our secondary couldn't process the route concepts being thrown at them, and our back end inexperience showed. I certainly wish the tackling had been better.

The Bell injury was impactful I'm sure, but mostly just served to underscore the season-long problem with Pittsburgh's offense--namely, their receiving threats outside of Brown don't scare anyone. It's tough to get *too* upset about all the drops and mistakes, since under normal circumstances these guys would still be deep reserves or practice squad guys, not starters in an AFCCG. (This will be a major offseason concern, since the injured/suspended players--Bryant, Wheaton and Green--are all question marks to return IMO.) I actually thought Ben threw the ball really well...but with Bell out and NE predictably bracketing Brown, this becomes a somewhat punchless offense, one that's incapable of matching NE score-for-score.

So basically, disappointing result for the Steelers...but not unexpected, since all of the feared matchup issues were on full display. Realistically, this is probably about as far as this particular group could advance; New England's just a better team.

Good luck in the SB. Should be a very interesting matchup as Atlanta has some bona fide "Greatest Show On Turf" stuff going on. But I'm confident BB&Co, with 2 full weeks of prep, can figure out ways to stop them.

Till next year,

lillloyd

I'll never understand why you guys run the same gameplan defensively vs us and expect a different result. Thanks for the post though it's always a pleasure to see you here. Don't be afraid to stop by when we aren't going head to head.