By Matthew Marczi
- Jarvis Jones sure got an ear-full after the special teams penalty. The Steelers really hurt themselves on special teams with stupid mistakes. In the first half, they were offsides on a kickoff. In the second half, Shaun Suisham sent one out of bounds before the end zone.
- Will Allen played 32 snaps in this game, and he didn’t look like he missed a beat from when he was filling in for Troy Polamalu last season.
- Cameron Heyward has some missteps this week. There were a few running plays where he was blown off the ball, and although he registered a sack, the Bills generally kept him in check.
- As I mentioned in the first half, Lawrence Timmons played with much more power this week. His sack of E.J. Manuel was certainly forceful.
- Not a very impressive week for Fernando Velasco. With the amount of pressure he gave up, it’s a wonder he didn’t allow a sack, though he came close.
- Bad look for Jason Worilds on the reception in which the receiver fell down with the ball four yards behind the line of scrimmage. He took a circuitous route to make the tackle, and by the time he got there, the receiver was up and ended up with a gain of one.
- More red zone struggles. Leave it to a bottom-feeding team to jump offsides to give you a second life though. That’s losing football.
- While I am by no means opposed to bubble screens, even I will admit that Todd Haley could give them some more advantageous looks.
- And a pancake block for Mike Adams.
- Troy Polamalu looked active and energetic again. That’s been missing for a couple weeks. He made two great plays on balls that didn’t go as pass deflections, but served the same purpose anyway. No stats, but same result.
- Jerry Hughes went unblocked by both David DeCastro and Le’Veon Bell on a sack. But then he went on to pat Bell down as though he were checking for contraband. Almost as weird as Rashard Mendenhall dry humping Ben Roethlisberger a couple years back.
- Curtis Brown looked pretty good on special teams. Here’s to hoping he gets his head right.
- Note that when Ike Taylor came out for a play, Antwon Blake stepped in.
- It always seems as though the line opens up at least one big hole per game for Jonathan Dwyer, but they always follow it up with a loss.
- Hughes just beat Kelvin Beachum to the edge for a sack. I wonder if anybody still thinks he can be a long-term left tackle.
- Both outside linebackers got pressure on Ryan Clark’s interception.
- David DeCastro got blown up by Marcel Dareus on the following play to drop Bell for a four-yard loss.
- It was certainly nice and all that Jones got his first sack, though in all fairness, he did beat C.J. Spiller.
- Back to Dwyer on special teams. He threw a block down the field on Antonio Brown’s 5-yard return that helped spring him for about an extra 20. The more you can do, right?
- Too bad they failed once again to take advantage in the red zone.
- This game was nowhere near as close at the final score. The Steelers could have easily had 30 or more.
- Were it not for a nifty catch by Chris Hogan on the last drive, E.J. Manuel’s day could have looked a whole lot worse.
- Once again the Steelers hurt themselves. Steve McLendon’s penalty on the fumble that was overruled gave the Bills half the distance to the goal and an extra down to play with. Of course they scored on fourth down. Not that it mattered.
- Chris Gragg was easily offsides on his touchdown reception.
