Brian Roach’s Good, Bad & Ugly – Steelers vs. Ravens
It’s the end of the first quarter of the season. When I broke the season down a few months back, I predicted that the Steelers would be 3-1 at the end of the first quarter. The Steelers are, in fact, 3-1 (OK, I admit, I had them beating the Bears and losing to the Ravens, but I’ll take the division victory over the non-divisional loss).
The Steelers closed out the first quarter with a decent road victory in Baltimore – a place they haven’t won since 2012.
Was it pretty? Is it ever when it’s Steelers/Ravens?
Let’s break this game down in this week’s edition of “The Good, the Bad and the Ugly”.
Good
SHAZAM!
Ryan Shazier took a lot of heat last week for overrunning plays and missing a couple tackles. That’s what you get when you are the most athletic linebacker in the league.
Somebody at SCU said that they don’t think that Shazier “knows his own speed”. The thing about Shazier is that when he’s on, he is making plays all over the field. When he’s off, he’s still pretty good, but he’s missing a few of those plays. Last week he was off.
This week he was on.
10 solo tackles (one for loss), three pass defenses and a pick. That’s a pretty good game for the “Shake” part of “Shake and Bake”.
For Whom the Bell Tolls
144 yards rushing (on 35 carries – average of 4.11) and 2 rushing TDs. 4 receptions for 42 yards. That’s the kind of stat line we have been looking for from Le’Veon Bell. 186 total yards from scrimmage.
Despite the fact that the Ravens were missing a key component to their defensive line (Brandon Williams) this is still a unit that is tough to run on. Bell looked to be back in mid-season form as he showed his trademark patience and burst.
If Bell continues to return to form in the upcoming weeks, this will only help the Steelers offense become the monster we all keep expecting it to be.
Hilton Hive
Zach Metkler (@GZSports_ZM) has been the resident president of the Hilton Hive chapter here at SCU, followed closely by Zacedonia (@ZeFlash1) as the happy Hilton puppy who just wants attention. I have been hesitant to jump on the Hilton Hive Hype Train because I wanted to see more.
Mike Hilton has shown me enough – count me in. Sacks (I love his blitz ability), INT’s, tackles, pass defenses. Hilton is making a difference when given the opportunity and his snap count has been increasing because of it.
At least the Steelers are getting some production from one Ole Miss cornerback!
Dragon Ball JuJu
Feeling like Goku 😂 pic.twitter.com/aaLErS7dra
— JuJu Smith-Schuster (@TeamJuJu) October 2, 2017
I admit it, I had no idea what in the world JuJu Smith-Schuster was doing with his TD celebration.
I also admit that having it explained to me hasn’t actually helped.
I don’t care. The 20-year-old rookie is delivering big things early in his career.
Big catches. Big scores. Big (and nasty) blocks.
Ben and JuJu appear to be developing a rapport, which is also a good sign for JuJu (and a not so good sign for Eli Rogers, who found himself inactive for this game).
If JuJu keeps this up, he can feel like Goku all he wants and I don’t ever need to understand what that means.
The Horsemen Return
Earlier in the season, Cam Heyward said that the D-line needed a nickname. I put forth “The Horsemen”. I like it, and I don’t care what anyone else thinks. (I wanted it to be the Three Horseman of the Apocalypse, but that’s too long). The Horsemen haven’t been together since the first two snaps of the Browns game, unfortunately.
Cam Heyward has been a force all season. Javon Hargrave has been only slightly less so. The only guy who has been missing has been Stephon Tuitt, and he was back this week in a big way.
The pressure we are getting from 3 and 4-man fronts are fantastic. Cam’s bull rush is overwhelming. Javon’s quickness and the first step is nearly impossible to stop and Tuitt looks like he’s on the verge of being the best of the three.
It was nice seeing all three of them out there again, and even better seeing the Raven’s admittedly decimated O-line struggle to keep them at bay.
Bad
Temper, Temper
This is a rarity. Antonio Brown never gets tagged as bad. He’s simply never “bad”.
But that temper tantrum wasn’t the best look for a player who had to battle through being labeled selfish by some last year.
The play in question, when reviewed, had Brown running a cross or a slant (to be honest I’m not sure) and when Ben first looked at him, he was double covered. As Ben turns away, Brown breaks the route off and changes it, and suddenly is wide open for what appears would have been an easy touchdown.
Ben never saw it. He never came back to Brown and threw the ball to a different receiver. This wasn’t a route that AB changed because Ben was in trouble or scrambling. He saw something and decided to alter the route, and it could have been a huge play.
But let’s be fair – Ben doesn’t know he changes the route. When Ben saw him, he was covered. Even if he looks back for him – he is going to look where he thinks AB should be, not necessarily where he actually ended up. Ben didn’t “miss a wide-open AB”. He simply didn’t come back to him.
Brown’s reaction was to take out the Gatorade cooler and stalk around the sidelines like a scorned child. I love AB. I love his passion and his desire and his work ethic. I believe he wants to be the best, and I believe he wants this team to win a championship. I also think he might have gotten used to the spotlight shining solely on him. Receivers have a reputation for being divas.
It wasn’t a good look for him. I appreciate the frustration, but I think he could have handled it better.
Yellow Flags Abound
I mentioned this on the postgame podcast, but it’s definitely worth noting here as well. On the first two scoring drives the Steelers had, they had to settle for field goals. Not because the Ravens really stopped the Steelers. No, it was penalties that doomed those drives.
The Steelers continue to have issues with red zone penalties, and those can be the difference between winning and losing in a close game. This stuff really needs to be stopped.
Ugly
What’s A Catch?
I don’t care what the explanations are. I don’t care which side of the issue you come down on. I don’t care if you think AB was down or if you think the whistle was blown and the play was therefore dead.
I just don’t care.
The bottom line is simple – determining what a catch is shouldn’t be this @!@$%!&*! Difficult!
Can we please just stop the insanity of “football moves” and “complete the catch all the way through coming to the ground” and just decide something simple that the guys who wear striped shirts can easily understand (not to mention the rest of us). If the receiver catches the ball, gets two feet down and takes a step (or maybe two) – it’s a catch. At that point, he’s a runner and those rules should apply.
Sheesh.
Conclusion
I just want to state again for the record – the Steelers WON. To listen to the outcry from some areas of the Nation you might think we lost.
Last week everyone complained that we didn’t run enough. This week it’s that we ran too much. Let’s just admit that some of us will never be happy unless the final score is Steelers 70 and whoever else they are playing scores zip. That’s a bit of unrealistic expectation, but you know what – everyone is entitled to their opinion. If that’s what it takes to make you happy – so be it.
For me, I’m content that we are 3-1, in first place in the division and look to be a team that is improving.
Bring on the second quarter!
