Pittsburgh Steelers head coach Mike Tomlin held his press conference on Thursday to talk about the upcoming preseason game Saturday night against the Buffalo Bills and below is the audio along with the talking points.
Tomlin said that the starters on both offense and defense will play at least a half against the Bills and that he would see where it goes from there.
As far is injured players go, Tomlin said that running back Jason Ford (hamstring), linebacker James Harrison (knee), running back Rashard Mendenhall (knee) and linebacker Stevenson Sylvester (knee) all will not make the trip to Buffalo and are out for Saturday. Nose tackle Casey Hampton (knee) will travel with the team but is unlikely to play. Tomlin did not mention punter Jeremy Kapinos (back) or linebacker Jason Worilds (wrist) in his status update. As far as tackle Max Starks (knee) goes, Tomlin said that that the intentions are that he will play.
Tomlin was asked about wide receiver David Gilreath and he said that he has been consistent and shows good short area quickness.
Due to all of the injuries at linebacker, Tomlin said Chris Carter is taking advantage of situation and is improving.
Tomlin did not give an indication of which quarterback would enter the game after Ben Roethlisberger is done for the night, but the belief is that Byron Leftwich will be second and be followed by Charlie Batch. Jerrod Johnson will likely not see much, if any, playing time Saturday night.
[audio:https://steelersdepot.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/08/mike-tomlin-press-conference-bills-preseason.mp3]
