Steelers miss opportunity
The Steelers couldn’t have asked for more. The Baltimore Ravens and Houston Texan both lost this week, giving the Steelers an opportunity to take possession of the #1 seed in the AFC playoffs. All the Steelers had to do was win on Monday night.
D’oh!
The lights in San Francisco went out right before the game was supposed to start, and they never seemed to come back on for the Steelers.
The 49ers Marched up and down the field, and the Steelers’ defense seemed incapable of stopping them. If Alex Smith weren’t their quarterback, the 49ers probably would have scored even more than the 20 points that they put on the board against the Steelers.
But the Steelers defense wasn’t the biggest problem. The offense looked completely inept. And that’s being kind.
The biggest problem was that Ben Roethlisberger was still nursing a high ankle sprain. With first place on the line, I understand the coaches’ decision to start Big Ben. After all, the Steelers have several players who are nursing injuries, and securing a 1st round playoff bye would have been a nice luxury to have. So while some may question the decision to start Roethlisberger, it’s easy to understand why the coaches did it.
What I DON’T understand is why they kept him in the game after he threw his 3rd interception. Or why they kept him in the game after he made his second fumble. Or why they kept him in the game when the 49ers had an insurmountable lead, and there was not enough time left for the Steelers to win the game. Why did the coaches keep Ben in the game until the bitter end?
I know that Ben doesn’t like to come out of games. Ever. But it’s the coaches job to make decisions for Ben that he’s unwilling to make for himself. That’s why they’re coaches, and he’s a player. Besides, why does the team pay Charlie Batch and Dennis Dixon if they don’t have confidence in their ability to come in and win a game? Is Ben on one leg better than Charlie or Dennis on two healthy legs? If so, then we need better backup quarterbacks.
What if Ben had broken his arm with 2 minutes left in the game and no chance for the Steelers to win anyway? Wouldn’t we all be screaming about what a poor decision the coaches made? Well it was still a poor decision, even though Ben didn’t sustain any serious injuries.
So now the Steelers have two games remaining, and the coaches have another difficult decision to make. Do they rest their players who are nursing injuries, or do they play them and try to win their final two games?
What do you say, Steeler Nation? Should The Steelers try to win the next two games, or should they rest players like Ben, LaMarr Woodley, Maurkice Pouncey, and Troy Polamalu, who have all been nursing injuries? Let us know your opinion.
Go Steelers!
I’m on favor of resting players, but Tomlin’s history indicates he’ll do otherwise. Remember Ben going of the field on a stretcher in Cleveland? Maybe Tomlin will change his mind this year.
1No question in my mind that we should be resting Ben and Troy. Batch and Dixon can beat the Rams. We won’t win in the playoffs if Ben has no mobility and falls to the ground at the slightest touch because he has no strength in his foot.
2My observations:
1. Ben should not of played last night, and should sit for the remaining 2 games. He was missing receivers all night, and is clearly not in football shape.
2. Question for Mr. Lebeau: The 49ers, without a good deep threat and Alex Smith at QB, were obviously not going deep. So why were the corners playing like 10 yards off?!? The Steelers tend to do this against the short passing game, and I can understand if there is a huge deep threat present, but what was that last night?
3I agree, especially after we demonstrated the effectiveness of our man-to-man coverage against a far superior offense from New England.
4@Jim,
5I agree with you. Tomlin’s history says that he’ll probably play Ben. He hasn’t announced what he’s going to do yet, and he probably won’t until the last moment. But he tends to play his players if they’re capable of taking the field. And we all know that Ben hates to not play, so he’ll probably be in Tomlin’s ear begging him to let him play.
Dan,
I disagree that Ben shouldn’t have played at all last night. We had an opportunity to get a 1st round bye. It was worth going for.
What I had a problem with was the fact that they didn’t take him out after it became clear that he wasn’t effective. He had 5 turnovers! Sure, we recovered 1 of his fumbles, but that doesn’t change the fact that he fumbled twice. And everyone saw his 3 interceptions.
IMO, if your starting QB is injured, limping, grimacing, fumbling, throwing interceptions, and missing wide open receivers, it might be time to bring in the backup QB. Especially when there’s 2 minutes left in the game, and your team is down by 17 points.
If Ben had gotten seriously hurt in the last 2 minutes of the game, Tomlin and Arians would have looked like complete idiots. They dodged a bullet, but that doesn’t make their decision any less stupid. Ben has to be protected at all cost. And sometimes, he has to be protected from himself.
6Dan R.,
I agree that we should rest our injured players from here on. Woodley, Ben, and Pouncey shouldn’t play at all. Troy and Emmanuel Sanders should only play on a limited basis. And the moment that either of them even looks like they may be tightening up, take them out.
We should be able to beat Cleveland and St. Louis without those guys. If we can’t, shame on us.
I know that there’s still a mathematical chance for the Steelers to get the 1st or 2nd seed. But I don’t think it’s worth the risk to go for it. Instead, I think they should just rest their players and take a healthy team into the playoffs.
7My thoughts…Yes, Ben should have started, the game was that important and we didn’t know how effective he would be until it was tested. And no, he shouldn’t have been in once it was 20-3.
Don,
I think you are contradicting yourself a little in your last response or maybe I’m just misinterpreting it. I think all you are trying to say is we should rest our injured players for the final 2 games. I agree with that.
That doesn’t need to relate, however, to the worth of getting a 1 or 2 seed. Specifically, YES, the mathematical chance to get a 1 or 2 seed is definately worth playing for. The key point here is that the marginal improvement of our chance of victory over the Rams and Browns (by playing injured players) is negligible. As you said, we should be able to easily beat these teams without Ben and the others.
Now that it is proven that Ben’s performance is significantly degraded with the injury there is no harm in playing Batch or Dixon instead. Does anyone think that they couldn’t have managed 3 points against SF?
If we win out, we need the Ravens, and either the Texans or New England to lose 1 game. That’s plausible…not likely but definately plausible.
8John,
I’m not sure where the contradiction happened. But I’ll try to clarify.
Getting a #1 or #2 seed is worthwhile. It give us a first round bye. That’s like winning a game without having to play it. It would also give our guys more time to rest and heal.
I think that beating SF was our best chance of gaining the first round bye. I may be proven wrong, but I don’t think that Baltimore is going to lose to Cincy. I also don’t think that Cleveland or St. Louis can beat the Steelers. I think the Steelers should beat them with our backup QB. After all, both of those teams are likely to be playing with their backup QB (unless Colt McCoy heals quickly, but that doesn’t look likely). I also think we should be able to beat them without LaMarr Woodley and Pouncey.
If it turns out that the Steelers can’t beat two of the worst teams in the NFL without a few starters, then shame on us.
9I guess contratiction would be the wrong word. What struck me was the statement of a 1 or 2 seed not being worth the risk. A 1-2 seed is a very big deal and is always worth going for unless the chance is truly insignificant.
The point I was trying to make was that the key issue on whether to play the injured stars has little to do with the chance of getting a 1-2 seed and more to do with the fact we don’t need them to beat the Rams/Browns – (the only part of the seed equation we control).
In my opinion, Ben/Woodley/Pouncey’s pressence (in their injured condition) does not significantly improve our chance to beat the Rams/Browns (because our chance of beating them is so high even without them). Hence, not playing them for the final 2 games doesn’t really have anything to do with our chance to secure a 1-2 seed.
We basically agree on this. I think I may have read your post too quickly and read more into it than you meant. Going back and rereading your post, I guess you were really just making a pre-emptory arguement against those who might argue that we should play Ben and the other’s to try to secure a 1-2 seed. As mentioned above, I agree with you that we shouldn’t.
On our actual chances of getting a 1-2 seed, I put it approximately at 20-25%. On the key game of Cincy-Ravens, I give the Bengals a 50% chance to win. The Ravens are a poor road team (only road wins are Rams, Browns, and Steelers)and Cincy should be fighting for their playoff lives.
10John,
I think we’re saying the same thing.
The only thing that I disagree with you about is Cincinnati’s chances of beating Baltimore. I have no confidence in the Bengals. I think our best chance of catching Baltimore was against SF, and we blew that.
Of course, I hope you’re right and the Bengals destroy the Ravens. That would certainly be the best gift that any of us receive this holiday season.
11Don,
I agree, if we’d beaten SF then we would control our own destiny and having to rely on the Bengals (in general) is something one wants to avoid.
In this particular instance, however, I have hope. Marvin Lewis always plays the Ravens tough, the Ravens have been lousy on the road this year, and the Bengals almost beat them the last time.
Of course, I might just be fooling myself…can’t discount that.
12does anybody agree with the idea that ben has hurt his team with his stubborness to play and has their coach admitted to any part of that mistake ? specifically i am referring to the 49ers game also ,by winning san fran game we could have rested starters and maybe Mendenhall and Ben would be healthy for the denver game?
13