Things looked rather promising early on for the Pittsburgh Steelers Saturday evening at Lucas Oil Stadium.
A 13-0 lead early in the second quarter thanks to a successful 4th-and-goal quarterback sneak from Mitch Trubisky, a blocked punt by Connor Heyward and a 3-yard touchdown from Diontae Johnson.
After that though, it was all Indianapolis Colts in the must-win matchup with major AFC playoff implications on the line.
The Colts scored 30 unanswered points and ran away with the game — literally — pummeling the short-handed Steelers’ defense over and over again.
Steelers’ rookie cornerback Joey Porter Jr. summed up the loss perfectly Saturday night when speaking to reporters.
“We played like shit today. There’s no sugarcoating that,” Porter said, according to a tweet from the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review’s Chris Adamski.
That’s one way to summarize what just occurred at Lucas Oil Stadium. The Steelers were bullied after getting up 13-0, plain and simple.
Coming into the season the Steelers wanted to play bully ball. They sure played bully ball on Saturday, only they were the ones who were bullied, and in rather embarrassing fashion, too.
At one point, the Colts ran the football 13 straight times, with third-string running back Trey Sermon and practice squad elevation Tyler Goodson dominating the Steelers on the ground. Though the Steelers were short-handed at safety with Damontae Kazee ejected and Minkah Fitzpatrick out for the game after getting hurt when cornerback Patrick Peterson landed on his leg, there is no excusing the way the highly paid defensive front was pushed around in the fourth quarter.
It wasn’t just the run game, either. The Steelers rarely had no answer for Gardner Minshew II and the Colts’ passing game. Minshew threw for 215 yards and three touchdowns, carving up the Steelers’ defense in the first half before leaning on the run game in the second half.
Head coach Mike Tomlin criticized the Steelers after the game, stating that the Steelers are playing losing football and poor fundamentally. Porter cut right to the chase though, stating the Steelers played like shit. Sometimes, the truth hurts. There’s no sugarcoating how the Steelers played Saturday, or how they’ve played in December, period.
Fitting those comments come from a rookie, too.
