Prior to the Pittsburgh Steelers Sunday game against the Seattle Seahawks, quarterback Ben Roethlisberger stated that he had no plans to shy away from throwing at cornerback Richard Sherman if he wound up being the one matched up against wide receiver Antonio Brown. Additionally, somewhere during the week a narrative also popped up that centered on Sherman having problems in the past covering smaller wide receivers such as Brown. After the Seahawks Sunday win, Sherman made it clear that he had heard that narrative and what he thought about it.
“I don’t guard small receivers well, so I don’t know what I did,” Sherman said, via the Seattle Times. “But that’s not what I do. I’m not very good at guarding small receivers. That’s my biggest weakness. So I don’t know what I did. I don’t guard small receivers well, so obviously he just dropped a bunch of balls. … You see people who have never played the game, who have never coached the game, who have never even stepped foot on the field, talk about how you’re not good against smaller receivers. You can’t call that. You don’t have enough knowledge. You don’t have enough intimate details. You don’t even know the game. You have a very low football IQ. It’s tough to take those people serious, but we went out there and executed today.”
As previously noted in a post, Sherman did indeed do a good job covering Brown on Sunday as he only allowed the Steelers top wide receiver to catch 3 passes during the game of which two were quick screens. Because of his performance, it’s not surprising that Sherman did a bit crowing after the game.
Sherman also recorded his first interception of the season on Sunday and many feel that he should have been called for pass interference or illegal contact on that play due to his contact with Brown that resulted in the wide receiver tumbling to the ground halfway through his route. However, while there was some contact on that play, a frame-by-frame breakdown of the play shows that Brown did trip over his own feet during the contact and this is more than likely why there wasn’t a flag thrown.
While Sherman is undoubtedly happy with the way he played on Sunday, the rest of the members of the Seahawks secondary played poorly as a group and it resulted in Steelers wide receiver Markus Wheaton having a career day that included him catching 9 passes for 201 yards and a touchdown. Hey, but at least Sherman did his job, right? Go, team!
