Just got home from Pittsburgh...

Interesting trip. If you just want game thoughts, scroll under the dashes.

Drove 8.5 hours in the morning on no sleep to Pittsburgh. Walked to a bar nearby, walking past a bunch of Steelers fans, getting booed for about 2 minutes straight was pretty cool. Nothing really malicious. Got mostly along with Steelers fans in the bar. We did a couple Jets chants.

Lots of Jets fans up there, was impressed with our turnout. Heard one Steeler fan say this is the most fans of an opposing team he's ever seen in town.

Then we walked back to the car to get more layers, getting booed again. I do the airplane thing sometimes to rile people up a little bit and have some fun. Walk inside, talk with some mostly friendly fans. Then the game starts....

Half our section is standing up, but we keep getting told to sit down from people in the next section. We were sitting in the lower corner, in the corner of the endzone, so we actually would block their view. Our response: "it's the AFC championship game, you can't stand up?" Plus, with other people standing up every other play, you can't see if you sit down anyway. Really, really hate that pet peeve, especially in a game of this magnitude. I do realize if I were a Steeler fan, I probably wouldn't have gotten yelled at, but that's to be expected.

There was some other asshole who kept leaning over the aisle and doing the 1st down signal right in our faces and looking at us. Talking shit like a douchebag all game long. There are fans like that everywhere, but there were also people around us who had no clue how many challenges each team has in a game, which was ridiculous to me.

Anyway, enough about Steelers fans and my time.

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Game thoughts.

I don't know if I'd say we came out flat because the Steelers made some plays, but they were clearly the aggressor in the first half. Mendenhall is a really talented back, but we need to tackle better. That was a pathetic showing by our defense. We could not get off the field on 3rd down, and against a very mediocre offensive line, we could not win any individual matchups. Pouha spoke of the DL taking it personally that Mendenhall ran for 99 yards last game. Well this time, he had 120+. Most of that was tackling.

Ben didn't play very well, but our 3rd down defense is atrocious. 6-11 was awful, and while Ben was off, he is clutch, and he grinds it out. Hell of a player. 3rd and 12, he'll pick up 12 yards. Also ran in for that TD. And then those two throws at the end of the game, he made them, and the Steelers' WR's made plays to catch them. They deserve credit for that, but if our defense is as good as it's supposed to be, we make that stop. There have been too many times in the last 2 years we've needed to make a stop, and we haven't been able to. Even last time in the Steeler game, we let them go all the way down the field, and we could have easily been called for PI to set them up for a TD.

We can bitch and whine about Schottenheimer all game, but we just didn't execute offensively. There were plays I certainly disagreed with. But that's not why we lost. I'm more angry at the lack of sense or urgency and the lack of communication between Sanchez and Schotty. Find a way to get the play in. If the headsets aren't working, then tell a sub to get the play in, or tell Sanchez to run no huddle.

We ran the ball like crap all game. Sure, we did decently in the 2nd half, but our big run came on a 2nd and long draw. Our line created few holes. Cotchery had a huge drop early in the game when we needed to stop the Steeler momentum. None of the skill position players made superstar plays.

Should we have run 4 times on that 1st and goal from the 2? Probably. I liked the Shonn Greene fullback dive as a play. I'd probably throw once out of the 4 plays, but Greene is the better back and the more powerful back. Would much rather see him on the 4th and goal. The OL got zero push, so I doubt it makes a big difference, but my point remains. Keller could have made that catch.

But really, whenever we needed to make a big play, Pittsburgh had an answer and made a play themselves. Wilson needs to make that INT. Revis needs to make that INT. Our pass rushers couldn't get to Ben, even with their best lineman Pouncey leaving early in the game.

I'm just disappointed with the way we didn't show up in the 1st half. The offense started off slowly, what else is new? The defense, which was supposed to be our pride and joy, suddenly forgot how to tackle, and communication issues returned. Miller and Mendenhall had plays where they were left completely uncovered, and Ben took advantage.

And special teams, which needed to be a factor for us to win, instead let us down...again. And by that, I mainly mean Weatherford. Another piss-poor game by him. Inexcusable. Folk made his only kick, that was good, but their return game was better than ours. We couldn't do that.

All of our defensive issues came to the forefront in this one. 3rd down defense? Awful. Pass rush? Nonexistent mostly. Big plays? Not there. Yes, we had two picks, but one meant little since if he didn't make the catch, it would have been our ball anyway, and the other one, while it was a nice play, it was giftwrapped by Ben.

When Pittsburgh made a big play on defense, they got 7 points. We got a safety, but even that was on a botched snap with the backup center.

I love the fight we showed in the 2nd half. We deserve credit for coming back, and our defense did show up in the 2nd half. But we never really put a lot of fear into the Steelers fans. The two chances we had to really put fear in the Steelers, we got stuffed on 4th and goal, and we allowed two 1st downs for them to ice the game.

Where do we go from here? It's really a difficult question. Sanchez is emerging into a very good QB in front of our eyes, but he needs to be consistent through the regular season. Then, we can get home games in the playoffs. Then we can possibly get a bye, which gives us one less chance to have a bad game. To me, getting a bye is more important than getting home field. I know we're not that good after a bye, but having to win 3 games to get to the SB is much different than needing 4 wins.

I'm confident in this coaching staff. Schottenheimer drives me nuts, but I think it's important he stays for continuity. This offense continuously gets closer to putting it all together, but we're just not there yet. Sanchez's development should improve that.

But where we need players is on defense. With just the additions of Scott and Leonhard, Ryan turned this defense into a monster last year. This year, it took a step back. There's no question about that. And defensively, we just don't have playmakers. Revis is a playmaker, but this is why cornerbacks can't get $20 million a year, he has very little chance to make big plays for us because opposing teams just avoid him. Our safeties are not impact players. Our LBs are not impact players. Harris and Scott are solid ILBs, but neither is a playmaker. And neither are Pace and Thomas. None of our DL are either.

We have a bunch of good role players on defense. But we need a DB who can make plays that can change the course of a game. Leonhard, Pool, Smith, all solid role players, but we need someone who is more athletic and can make impactful plays, not just the simple ones. The DL, again, we have solid role players, but when we need to win one-on-one matchups and make impact plays to win games, they're just not good enough.

We're close. We're on the way. We're set at head coach and at quarterback. I'm very happy with both. Winning on the road at Cincy, San Diego, Indy, and New England in the playoffs is extremely impressive. There's no shame in losing at Indy last year or at Pittsburgh this year. It only seems that way because of the expectations we try to set for ourselves.

Really curious to see what we do in the offseason now. We desperately need a youth infusion on the DL and at LB. We desperately need some big, young, athletic guys who can get after the quarterback. And we really need an impact safety who teams have to worry about. Even with Leonhard, we don't have that.

I've typed a lot, and didn't really plan much of it out as I was writing it, so it's a little rambly. I'll try to watch the game again because there are really some things I want to see again.

The bottom line with this game is the Steelers made clutch plays. Clutch plays on 3rd down, clutch plays late in the game, and a huge goalline stand on defense that would have iced the game if we don't get a safety. Pittsburgh is well-coached and has ultimate confidence it will pull out the game late because they have the track record of doing so. We don't, and when we needed to make a play, we didn't.

/rant

 

1st of all, the angle of where we were sitting was awful. We were in the corner of the endzone, and it was hard getting adjusted to depth perception and getting a good angle. Didn't see a lot of spies though...

The Steelers fans seemed to give the Jets credit, but I don't think they ever really felt threatened. They may have been a little nervous heading into that 3rd and 6 play, and then Ben makes the play.

I do think they were pretty surprised when Cotchery scored. Don't think they thought we would be able to stick the ball in the endzone.