I'm talking about that lame-ass pass interference call in the first quarter that set up their only touchdown. I'm talking about phantom holding calls -- the last one on Sean McHugh actually wasn't bad, just ill-timed -- flags getting picked up when they shouldn't have been dropped in the first place (everyone I've talked to knows that it's not possible to get flagged for illegal contact if the quarterback is outside of the pocket), and not calling holding when there was holding (in the end zone on James Harrison is the first case that springs to mind, but there were others). There's something wrong with how a game is called if one team has 115 penalty yards and the other has five.
The Good:
- Fast Willie had 115 yards on 25 carries against a damn good front seven.
- For as many times as we passed the ball -- 45 dropbacks! -- Ben Roethlisberger was only sacked four times. That's still a lot. That's still too many. But, it's a better ratio than we had earlier in the season.
- Speaking of Roethlisberger, he averaged over seven yards an attempt. Sure, it was the worst pass defense in the NFL, but at least he threw for 300 yards and didn't throw an interception.
- The pass defense held up, even though there wasn't a ton of pressure on Philip Rivers. He came into the game with some impressive statistics -- as I mentioned -- and was held to 164 yards (6.3 per attempt), no touchdowns, and was intercepted twice.
- We shut LaDanian Tomlinson down.
- Troy Polamalu is back in 2005 form and might be better than he was in 2005. He forced two turnovers, scored a touchdown, made a bunch of plays in the back field, and contained Antonio Gates. Yes. I'm pretending the last play counted.
- Matt Spaeth might work better for this offense than Heath Miller. Since he can't block, they don't depend on him too much in the running game. But, since he can't block, they assume he can catch, so they look for him in the passing game.
- The offense gained 432 yards and scored nine points. That's pathetic.
- Were 0-3 in Goal-To-Go situations. Three trips inside the 10, three failures. Note to Tomlin: "Running back left" was only guaranteed success when Faneca played for us. Now, everyone is looking for it and everyone can stop it. Maybe try a play action pass on the next third and goal, huh?
- Paul Ernster averaged 31 yards per punt. Kinda makes me long for the days of Bitch Merger and his two bad hammies.
- We averaged 17 yards a kick return, had zero punt returns, and totally screwed the pooch on the free kick after the safety.
- So, basically, our special teams are atrocious, even though our coverage units did a pretty good job.
If I told you that we played a team, forced three turnovers (I'm counting the last one), scored a touchdown, got a safety, didn't turn the ball over, and outgained them 432-225, what would you think the final score was? Gotta be at least 24-10, right? Maybe 34-13? Even going with a best case scenario and assuming the refs got it right, it's an 18-10 victory.
Choking in goal to go situations isn't going to beat anyone in the playoffs.
Crappy special teams play isn't going to beat anyone in the playoffs.
Failing to capitalize on turnovers isn't going to beat anyone in the playoffs.
We've reached the point in the season where thinking about the playoffs isn't a jinx-worthy endeavor. If we make the playoffs, we've got to play much better and much more efficient than we have the past two weeks.
We'll probably be able to get past the Bungles with at least a tie if we play like this on Thursday, but there's no way we beat the Patriots or the Titans, or probably the hated Ravens playing sloppy football like that.
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