They hung around Sunday night on the Heinz Field lawn after their 16-13 win against the Cincinnati Bengals, players and coaches alike, watching the big scoreboard, hoping the Cleveland Browns somehow could find a way to win at the end in Baltimore.
They found a little life when two late replay reviews went the Browns’ way.
They died a little when Cleveland quarterback Baker Mayfield threw behind an open Jarvis Landry on a second-and-10 play from the Baltimore 39 that would have put the Browns in field-goal range for the win.
They died hard when Mayfield’s third-down pass fell incomplete and his fourth-down pass was intercepted, assuring the Ravens – not the Steelers -- would win the AFC North title with a 26-24 win.
It’s safe to assume few if any Steelers stayed up late Sunday night to watch the end of the Indianapolis-Tennessee game. They needed a miracle in that game – an unlikely tie -- to make the playoffs as the No. 6 seed in the AFC.
There was virtually no hope in the Steelers’ locker room, just plenty of resignation.
“It’s going to be a long off-season,” Cam Heyward said.
The longest of the Mike Tomlin era.
We just watched the Steelers complete one of the worst collapses in franchise history. They started 1-2-1 before winning six games in a row to go to 7-2-1, looking very much like a team headed to a No. 1 seed. They then lost four of their next five before the win Sunday night against the Bengals. Their season shouldn’t have come down to Browns-Ravens. There is no way.
That’s the beauty of sports, right?
A team almost always gets what it deserves.
The Steelers got exactly what they deserve.
“We tried to win games, but not executing in those critical moments will bite you,” Heyward said. “It makes me mad as a leader of this group, that we put ourselves in a situation like this, looking for others to do our job. It’s frustrating. It’s unacceptable.”
So what was the Steelers’ worst loss? The one at Denver when Xavier Grimble fumbled away a touchdown and Ben Roethlisberger threw a late interception to a defensive tackle? The home loss to the Los Angeles Chargers when they led 23-7 at halftime and received the ball to start the third quarter? Or how about the surreal defeat in Oakland to the then 2-10 Raiders?
Ramon Foster was in no mood to reflect.
“I’m not ready for it to end, not even close to being ready,” he said. “If we don’t open our eyes to this next year, then we are just plain idiots. It isn’t what we do in times when we have a six-game winning streak. It’s what we do if we drop one. It’s how we bounce back. We didn’t do that this year. Last year, we did. It was cozy, really cozy. This year, not so much. I hate to say it’s a learning experience …
“I hate to learn like this.”
Sports might be fair, but they also can be brutal. A team works hard in the off-season, turns it up in the heat of training camp and plays 16 games for a chance to extend the season and compete for a Super Bowl. When that goal is snatched away suddenly – in the case Sunday night when Mayfield’s final fourth down pass was intercepted by Ravens linebacker C.J. Mosley -- there is shock and pain, but mostly pain.
“You know it. Everyone in the league knows it. Owners know it. GMs know it. We have the goods,” Foster said.
“But … ”
That Steelers team won’t be playing football in January, won’t make it to a Super Bowl for the first time since the 2010 season and won’t win a championship for the first time since 2008.
If you had told that to Roethlisberger in mid-November after the Steelers came from behind to beat Jacksonville for their sixth win in a row, he would have told you that you were crazy.
“Would’ve, could’ve, should’ve,” he said. “I can sit here and say, ‘Yeah, we would be dangerous in the playoffs, but we didn’t make it. So it doesn’t matter.”
So here comes the off-season, sooner than anyone at Steelers headquarters expected.
Did I mention brutal?
Yes, definitely, brutal is the right word.
https://www.post-gazette.com/sports/ron-cook/2018/12/30/Ron-Cook-Steelers-complete-possibly-the-worst-collapse-in-franchise-history/stories/201812310081
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