Steelers Today – A Pittsburgh Steelers blog

The Pittsburgh Steelers travel to Nashville to face the Tennessee Titans on Thursday night.  The game will be broadcast on NFL Network at 8:20 p.m.

I remember when Pittsburgh vs. Tennessee had all of the excitement of a Steelers/Ravens game.  But that was back when both teams played in the now defunct AFC Central Division.  These days, the game doesn’t generate nearly as much excitement.  But it’s still a game that the Steelers have to win.

The Titans have a woeful 1-4 record, and have struggled on both offense and defense.

On offense, Tennessee’s star running back Chris Johnson is having one of the worst seasons of his career.  He’s averaging only 42 yards per game.  That’s 2.9 yards per carry.   His longest run of the season is only 19 yards, and he has no touchdowns.  That’s not the Chris Johnson that Titans fans are used to seeing.

To make matters worse, the Titans are without their starting quarterback Jake Locker, who is out with a shoulder injury.  Veteran QB Matt Hasselbeck will start in his place.

On defense, the Titans are even worse.  They have the 29th ranked defense in the NFL, and they seem incapable of stopping either the run or the pass.    Their opponents have scored an average of 36.2 points against the Titans, as the Titans’ defense has allowed an average of 423 yards per game.  There are high school teams that would have given up fewer yards against the teams that the Titans have played.

The Titans give up 144 yards per game on the ground, which should make Rashard Mendenhall very happy.  And they’ve allowed 12 touchdowns passes, which is 2nd worst in the league.  That should make Ben Roethlisberger even happier.

But the Steelers aren’t without their own challenges.  Playing in Tennessee is never easy.  More importantly, the Steelers will be without LaMarr Woodley and Troy Polamalu.  Both players suffered injuries in the Steelers’ win over the Philadelphia Eagles last week.

I anticipate the Steelers will keep their offense balanced to keep the Titans guessing.  They should have success in both the running game and the passing game.  This balanced attack should prove to be too much for the Titans.

I predict that the Steelers will win this game.  The final score will be 31-16.

Go Steelers!

I hadn’t realized how much I missed Rashard Mendenhall………until after he returned to the Steelers.  Without Mendenhall, the Steelers struggled to gain yards on the ground.  Calling their running attack impotent would have been an insult to impotence.

But in his first game back, Mendenhall reminded Steelers fans why he has been the starting running back for the Steelers since 2009.  Mendenhall rushed for 81 yards on 14 carries.  That may not sound particularly impressive, but it was an average of 5.8 yards per carry.  Isaac Redman and Jonathan Dwyer struggled to gain 5.8 millimeters per carry in Mendenhall’s absence.

Mendenhall would have had over 100 yards rushing in his return, but he had a 24 yard run called back due to an illegal formation penalty on Mike Wallace.

Not only did Mendenhall’s return rejuvenate the Steelers’ running game, but it also seemed to rejuvenate the Steelers’ offensive line.  After each of his successful runs, you could see the offensive linemen smiling and congratulating Mendenhall.

Mendenhall runs wild!

But despite Mendenhall’s successful return, all did not go well for the Steelers.  Troy Polamalu seemed to re-injure his calf muscle, and didn’t return to the game.  LaMarr Woodley also went down with a hamstring injury.

The Steelers played pretty sloppily on both offense and defense, and they were penalized 9 times for 106 yards.  Fortunately Michael Vick’s play was even sloppier than the Steelers’.  Vick fumbled the ball 3 times during the game, and 2 of them were recovered by the Steelers.

The Steelers led the Eagles for most of the game.  In fact, they led until there was only 6:38 left in the 4th quarter, when the Eagles scored a touchdown and took a 14-13 lead.

Fortunately, the Steelers still had time for one final drive.  The Steelers marched down the field on a drive that consisted primarily of runs by Mendenhall and Isaac Redman.  The Steelers drove the ball all the way to the Philadelphia 16 yard line, and then with 3 seconds left, they called on kicker Shaun Suisham to win the game.  Suisham put the ball right between the uprights with no time left on the clock, and the Steelers had a 16-14 win.

The Steelers are now 2-2, and are in third place in the AFC North, behind Baltimore and Cincinnati.  They only have 4 days to prepare for a Thursday night game against the Tennessee Titans.

Go Steelers!