He has “broken” his thumb before and still played. Ask Cowher about it.
Dude, that’s bad news. We need Houston healthy enough to beat Cinci in week 14. If you assume Pittsburgh, Baltimore, and Cinci win all their games except against the 49ers, then we’re left with this:
BAL = 10-4 + 2 CIN games.
CIN = 10-3 + 2 BAL +1 PIT.
PIT = 11-4 + 1 PIT.
So assume CIN beats BAL twice and PIT beats CIN:
BAL = 10-6
CIN = 12-4, 4-2 division, loses head-to-head
PIT = 12-4, 4-2 division, wins head-to-head
Then we take the division via tie-breaker. But what if the Steelers slip up against CIN and they lose one to BAL? Then we have:
BAL = 11-5
CIN = 12-4
PIT = 11-5
Uh oh! Now we’re third. Wouldn’t it be nice to have a little insurance? Well, looking down the Bengals schedule, the only hope we have of saddling them with another loss is Houston, who’s 7-3. Our next-best hope is Arizona at 3-6!
A Houston win helps us win the division and puts them as their division winner (I think), clearing wildcard spots in case we slip up in any other game. So yeah, this is bad news.
I like Schaub but I really think they can win without him. With that line and the Tight Ends they have not to mention Andre Johnson being back at some point. Leinart just needs to run a caretaker offense. Their D hasn’t been too shabby either.
Has anyone noticed how young our “old” team has been looking at times? Ward is down to fourth or fifth on the unoffical depth chart and there’s a lot of speed at that position. The D-line can field Heyward, Hood, and McClendon at least for short streches without looking out of place. And then the secondary, with guys like Keenan Lewis and others looking solid.Some of the positions that I thought would be draft priorities next off-season really don’t look so bad right now.
Well, the Bengals game started out with a lot of promise, and it’s still tied so there’s still a chance, but it appears that the Ratbirds finally woke up. I’m hoping, but it’s not looking good.
Win this one, Cincinnati. Prove that you’re ready for prime time. In a lot of ways it’s your playoff life at stake.
…and they just got burned deep. Not looking good at all.
Hellhounds on both your trails! HELLHOUNDS!!!
Hey, it’s not my fault that they had their shots and couldn’t close it out. I call it like I see it. On the other hand, that “football move” stuff has simply got to go. A guy can break the plane and immediately fumble the ball and have a touchdown but a guy with the ball, two steps in, completely out of bounds, didn’t score a touchdown because he went down on his hand? Preposterous. They should have at least had that game in overtime because the last drive would have ended in a field goal.
Anyway, the Steelers get the Chiefs off the bye week? Does anybody think that they’re going to lose this game? I mean, you never know (see: Baltimore, vs. Seahawks, vs. Jaguars), but all the same this looks like it ought to turn out well. Word is that Woodley will be out again, but they’ve been doing OK without him and it’s better to keep him out until he’s 100% so it’s a good decision. Ben has a broken thumb but it appears that most of the offense will be run out of the shotgun, which might even keep him from getting killed as a side benefit. Besides, he seems to play better when he’s hurt, figure that one out.
You know, it’s amazing how fast the season has gone. It won’t be long until we’ll be suffering from withdrawal. I know it can’t really go on much longer than it does, but I do miss it in the offseason. But we still have a few months left, and I suppose that’s sufficient to the moment.
Once again, I will miss the game! 
Darn this getting old! In my youth, a few hours of sleep would have been plenty!
However, I think that they’ll get by without me telling them to Run! Run! Don’t Drop it! this week. Or at least I *hope *they will…
Go Steelers!
It’s only a matter of time until Pittsburgh scores, they’re winning this game everywhere but the scoreboard.
PICK! Pittsburgh at the 6! Here it is, guys.
Also, I hope Troy’s OK.
Pittsburgh is FEASTING on Palko. Love it.
TOUCHDOWN!
OK, so how quickly do they get the ball back from Palko this time?
Gotta give credit to KC, their defense is playing great. Pittsburgh is making this interesting. They should be up by 20. Instead it’s another heart attack game at the 2-minute warning.
Come on, Steelers, hold.
PICK!
Ballgame. Thank God.
That game barely feels like a win to me. I’m not sure where the problems were. The defense played well, but they were heavily assisted by a pretty poor performance by the opposing QB. The offense moved the ball pretty well, but the turnovers and penalties really hurt them.
Almost have to feel sorry for Palko. Dude just doesn’t have the arm for the NFL but he does have the brain and his receivers didn’t help him out much.
As far as the Steelers go…our guards suck. That’s why the running game is stalled despite having good backs and good blocking Tight Ends and willing WRs and it’s why teams penetrate the middle so easily.
Lord knows I’ve complained enough about Bruce Arians’ playcalling but he’s finally won me over. The play I wish he would have called tonight though is the screen to Wallace or Brown using Ward and Miller in the blocking assignments usually given to the Guard and Tackle on the side of the play. I forget who they ran that against earlier but it was brilliant and tonight would have been the ideal time to run it again.
Oh well, they won. Good for them. Now on to next week, I hope Polamalu is OK.
Yeah, the offensive line is better but still no great shakes. And yet, they’re getting the job done. Ben is doing what Ben does. He’s willing to hold onto the ball and take the hits, the offensive line is holding up well enough to let him do that, and that is good enough for now.
The big resistance to Arians came from the fact that the Steelers are traditionally “a running team”. Now that they have some seriously dynamic receivers the fans are perfectly happy to let Ben air it out. It’s not “Steelers football”, but it’s turned out to be quite successful. Once the fans got used to that idea all the calls for Arians’ head went away.
I’m not sure if it’s on Arians or Roethlisberger, but I’m really not a fan of all the deep throws. They’re frequently wasted downs and drive killers. This offense has the ability to sustain long drives and march down the field if they don’t waste downs on long incompletions. I’ll take a long drive for a TD over a quick 70 yard TD pass any day. It tires out the other team’s defense and allows the Steelers’ D to get some rest.
I agree that they probably do this too often and try to force it (see Roethlesberger’s pick last night) but the threat of those deep throws is what pulls the secondary deep and opens up the shorter throws.
BTW Kansas City’s defense played a monster game last night.
I have been wanting them to transition to a passing team since they drafted Ben. That is what the NFL is now, you have a quarterback who can do it, embrace it.
I don’t think there’s any realistic way the Steelers can miss the playoffs. With five games to go, the only teams with four or less losses and not leading a division are Cincinnati and Pittsburgh. And in order to lose a division lead, you’d have to lose more games (i.e. more that five total), so as long as the Steelers win three out of these last five, they’ll end with 5 losses.
Buffalo just lost to the Jets, so the only teams with five losses are Denver, Tennessee, and NY Jets. Denver will get a sixth loss to Chicago or New England. Tennessee will lose to New Orleans or Houston, and the Jets will lose to the the Giants or a Kyle-Orton-reinforced Kansas City.
Assume the Steelers lose to SF and Cinci. Even if the Jets, Cinci, and Titans win out, we’re still in as the sixth seed. We hold the head-to-head tie breaker against the Titans and we’d win the conference tie-breaker with the Jets (9-4 vs 8-5).
Strangely, if Denver wins out, then they don’t take our wildcard- they take Oakland’s division lead, and we win realistically win that tie-breaker, too.
Can anyone find a way to keep us out of the playoffs with a record of 11-5? The only one I can see is if Denver and Oakland win out.
I’d like to see the run game at least be a threat but I agree with you. The QB is there, the speedy WRs are there, the sure-handed TE is there, why not throw? It was a tough transition though because they have continually drafted linemen with a run-blocking skillset (except for Pouncey). You can’t have everything though so we’ll have to accept what we have. Bringing back Max Starks was huge IMO.