Have you ever been at a department store (Wal-Mart is the most frequent offender) and you see some 9 year-old kid arguing with his Mom about a toy he wants? Except that the 9 year-old is probably a little too intelligent for his own good, so instead of stamping his feet and shouting, he's actually presenting a pretty logical and cogent argument? So the Mom walks away, thinking that if she just ignores the kid, he'll eventually lose interest and put the toy down. Except that the kid follows her down the aisle, still holding the toy and still arguing.
Nine times out of ten, the Mom gives in and puts the toy in the cart. What I'd like to see sometime is for the Mom to haul off and smack the kid across the face and say, "I'm bigger than you and I'm stronger than you. I clothe, feed, and shelter you. I suggest that you put that toy down and shut up. And, before you say anything smart, remember that I drove you here." Rest assured, that kid will put the toy down, follow his Mom through the remaining aisles, and not even start to fuss when they have to wait 6 hours in the check-out (I hate Wal-Mart).
That's what we need to do to the Bengals. They seem all big and imposing. If we listen hard enough and we start to believe that they're a better team than we are, we'll eventually give in and let them win on Sunday.
However, if we smack them in the mouth, they'll follow us around for the rest of the day and not put up a fuss. They're not tough enough to win this game if we take the fight to them. They just aren't.
And, given that they're in the AFC North with us and the hated Ravens, they're trying to act like they're tough, but it really just comes off like that dude in middle school that didn't shave for three weeks just so he could have a little bit of a moustache. They need to find their identity, establish it, and assert their will over the other team.
When I say that, I don't mean that they need to bash people around, play suffocating defense, and rush for 200 yards. They need to do what they did to the hated Ravens on Thursday Night Football earlier this year. Throw the ball all over the field to set up something of a running game, run the no huddle, and control the tempo of the game by doing what they do best: Throwing the football.
They've tried to win too many games by playing defense, running the ball, and playing tough, smart football. And that's why they're only 8-7. Hopefully soon to be 8-8.
They'll be 8-8 if we bust one soundly across their chops. Seriously. That's all we need to do. We need to show them who's boss, make them our bitch, and the rest will take care of itself.
If we can do that, it will put the proper ending on this season. It's been rough, no question, but I don't know if we even deserve to be 8-8 with the way we've played, the two games we honked against Atlanta and Oakland, and the two games where we played well against great teams but lost it all when it mattered (San Diego and Jacksonville).
And, if we're able to come out running, control the line of scrimmage, and smack the Bungles around all game, we'll get close to establishing the kind of physical play that made us 26-6 the previous two seasons. I don't know if it's that Bettis retired, Cowher retired and forgot to tell everyone, or that the offensive line just isn't playing as well this year, but we don't seem to have that intensity, that physical edge.
Maybe it's Max Starks. I'm not going to pin a whole season of goal-to-go ineptitude on one guy (especially a right tackle), but he made a comment before the Cleveland game that really annoyed the shit out of me. He said that we'd struggled to run the football at some points this year because defenses were showing them an eight man front. Haven't the Steelers always faced an eight man front? Haven't they always just said, "screw it, we're running anyway, just try to stop us"?
And I think that loss of identity on offense (and somewhat on defense) is the biggest culprit this season. The last time we had a problem like this? 2003. Remember how that ended? 6-10. So, we ended up a little better in the long run, I guess.
This game isn't about playing spoiler (well, maybe a little), it's not about pride, and it's not about finishing out the season strong. It's about re-establishing our identity as a team. It would've been nice if we could've done this against a real team like the hated Ravens instead of kicking the shit out of some smarmy nine year-old, but I'll take what I can get.
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