The Pittsburgh Steelers lost to the Oakland Raiders 21-18 on Sunday and below is my list of winners and losers from the game. Feel free to add your own in the comments below.
Winners:
Lawrence Timmons – Timmons had eight total tackles and six of them were within three yards of the line of scrimmage. He even forced a fumble in the game while playing with a casted left hand that he broke last week.
Emmanuel Sanders – I will look past the false start and pick penalty in the first half. The false start I think was questionable. Sanders recorded seven big catches for 88 yards and a touchdown and it was all him on the two point conversion.
Troy Polamalu – Outside of being blocked by a wide receiver on the long run by Terrelle Pryor to start the game, Polamalu played well and was always around the football. He had a sack to go along with two passes defensed and an interception, which was a gift from Pryor.
Brett Keisel – Keisel had a rough opening few possessions on defense, but rebounded. all of his tackles were inside three yards of the line of scrimmage and recovered a fumble, a sack and a few pressures.
William Gay – Unless my count was off, Gay only allowed one reception and he recorded four total tackles.
Losers:
Shaun Suisham – Suisham finally missed his first field goals of the year and they cost the Steelers the game. 34 and 32 were the distances.
Zoltan Mesko – Mesko couldn’t handle the snap cleanly on his second punt and played a part in the block. He also had another JV punt of 30 yards late in the second quarter.
Ryan Clark – Clark was lost big time on the Pryor touchdown run to start the game and along with Vince Williams and Polamalu, he failed to bring down Raiders running back Darren McFadden at the three yard-line on one of his two touchdown runs. While he did total 12 tackles, only four of them came within five yards of the line of scrimmage.
Ike Taylor – Taylor didn’t give up many catches in the game, but the ones he did give up were pretty big ones and he wasn’t even close on them.
Antonio Brown – Yes, he did have nine catches in the game, but he should have had two more that would have been huge. His one drop in the fourth quarter came on third down and thus killed a drive. His second drop/fumble resulted in the ball coming out and being intercepted by Raiders cornerback Tracy Porter. Those were two big plays.
David Paulson – Allowed his man to block the punt and nearly allowed another one. I am afraid to look at his run blocking.
