The Pittsburgh Steelers ended up with 368 yards of offense against the Browns—but they only scored 19 points. The defense took the ball away three times—but they allowed 24 points and over 300 yards. The Browns went 4-for-4 on fourth down and 3-for-4 in the red zone. Chris Boswell even missed a field goal, and I believe locusts made an appearance at some point. I know there was a hailstorm.
It wasn’t good. And it also wasn’t typical, or likely repeat in that fashion, Merril Hoge believes. Appearing on 102.5 WDVE, the former Steelers RB talked about their loss last Thursday to the Browns. He actually agrees with George Pickens—the Steelers are clearly better. They just weren’t on that day.
“Nobody played well in the game. Nobody had a good day. Russell Wilson didn’t have a good day. The offensive line didn’t have a good day. The defense didn’t have a good day. They played about as bad as they could play—which is a good thing”, Hoge insisted about the Steelers’ performance. “It wasn’t what Cleveland did to them and they just couldn’t handle it. They just didn’t play well, for whatever reason. That does happen.
“But you have to put that one to bed real quick because you’ve got a lot of matchups coming up that you’re gonna have to play your best”. The Steelers have the Bengals, Eagles, Browns, Chiefs, Ravens, and Bengals still ahead.
The Steelers, he went on, are “not gonna be able to play sloppy football and beat the teams you’re up against going forward. And then you get Cleveland again—they should be able to handle them. They’re a better team than they are, period”.
The Steelers erased a 12-point fourth-quarter deficit before allowing the Browns to beat them. The defense even picked the ball off after the offense took the lead. But then the offense stalled, the special teams shanked a punt, and the defense couldn’t get a stop on money downs.
Granted, the officials missed a hold on Nick Herbig on a Browns fourth-quarter touchdown. But the Steelers did not lose their third game of the season because of that. If the defense gets a turnover that sets up a go-ahead score and then gets another turnover, that’s on you. The offense needed to close this one, and it didn’t.
The fact that the Steelers failed to close the game on offense while tittering with their Justin Fields look doesn’t help. They even had him attempt a deep pass—his first official attempt in a month—in the snow and wind, on third down. I, for one, am shocked that it didn’t work.
