Mike Tomlin talked about the Pittsburgh Steelers working to get the “stench” off themselves after a three-game losing streak. Former Steelers S Ryan Clark says that the stench is now like “Pepé Le Pew” after a fourth-straight loss.
Over the past four games, the Steelers have seemingly forgotten how to play good football. Once a 10-3 team in contention for the AFC’s No. 1 seed, they lost the last four games of the season for the first time since 1998 to finish as the fifth or sixth seed pending Sunday’s results. The things that made them a football team haven’t been seen in weeks.
“They are a bad football team right now,” Clark said via SportsCenter With Scott Van Pelt on ESPN after the Steelers’ 19-17 loss to the Cincinnati Bengals. “When you say bad football team, people are gonna think of some of the bottom dwellers that are attempting to get the first draft pick. It’s not that, but amongst the 14 team who still have an opportunity to play, the Pittsburgh Steelers, to me, limp into the playoffs being the team that’s playing the worst of all of them.”
What did the Steelers do really well for the first couple months of the season? They possessed the football and did a good job getting off the field as a defense. This helped them control the time of possession (TOP). The Steelers have possessed the ball for 101:05 over the last four games. That leaves 138:55 for their opponents during that span.
Saturday night wasn’t quite as bad as the historic TOP loss they suffered to the Eagles at the start of this losing streak, but it was pretty close. The Bengals had the ball for 38 minutes compared to the Steelers’ 22.
There are plenty of other stats you can point to, but they all generally feed into TOP. Ball security has been an issue. The turnover culture that the defense was thriving on for the first half of the season has essentially gone away.
There just hasn’t been complementary football. A month ago, it seemed like the offense, defense, or special teams could provide a spark in any given game. That made the Steelers seem like a “complete team” who could compete with just about anybody. Over the losing streak, all three phases have failed at one time or another. Complementary football is gone from Pittsburgh.
With the Los Angeles Chargers playing the Las Vegas Raiders Sunday, the Steelers will most likely end up the AFC’s sixth seed on the road against the Baltimore Ravens. They could have had a more favorable matchup against the Houston Texans had they beaten the Bengals.
“If you’re Mike Tomlin, who understands this game more than anyone, what are the positives you are selling to your team that tells you you can go beat the Baltimore Ravens?” Clark said. “As much as we love Mike Tomlin, we have to be honest. It is year after year of showing promise, of giving hope, and then falling flat early on in the playoffs. There has to be some change in that pattern.”
Tomlin spoke after the game about not having a clean slate just because the Steelers are now in the playoffs. He said they have to learn from their mistakes. There have been too many mistakes to simply learn from them all with just a week to prepare.
This team, with all the many changes to get the Steelers over the playoff hump, ended up with the same regular-season record as the Kenny Pickett-Matt Canada team from a year ago. A win against the Ravens in the first round doesn’t seem likely at this point. And another first-round exit in the playoffs could be pretty uncomfortable for everyone in the Steelers’ organization.
