Steelers vs. Jets ... Game Balls and Goats

What are your post-game thoughts?

Game balls:

Ben (He was accurate all night, no INTs, and executed well.)
A. Brown (He made catch after catch.)
Miller (Another solid game from our underrated TE.)
Wallace (Made a great circus TD catch.)
Woodley (A solid game rushing the QB nearly forced a couple of fumbles.)
Clark (Hitting hard and helping our secondary out.)
Haley (Called a good game after a slow start. Keeping Ben safe and advancing the offense.)
LeBeau (Defense looked much better prepared this week.)

Game goats:

The refs (They sucked to the highest of suckitude.)
Penalties (Way too many flags tonight.... even a few we didn't earn.)

Game balls on offense: Ben Roethlisberger and Antonio Brown. Clutch tandem all day long, with an honorable mention to Wallace for the endzone grab.

Game balls on defense: Ryan Clark. No need to elaborate.

Honorable mention to Holmes for crying all night. That was awesome.

My electricity went out and I missed almost the entire second quarter. Then I had some technical difficulties. To make a long story short, I missed a lot of the game. So my game balls and goats are based on what I saw ...

Game Balls

Suisham: We gave Suisham a lot of crap during the offseason. Most of us here wanted him gone. But two 45-yard field goals in Heinz Field earns him a Game Ball this week.

Butler: He dropped another punt somewhere around the 5. That's twice now in two games he's pinned the other team up against the goal line. We've been screaming for that kind of punting for years.

Wallace: He showed he's not a one-trick pony, getting open on some crossing and out routes. And how about the footwork on the TD?

A. Brown: He caught everything thrown his way. He did everything he's expected to do, and he did a hell of a job holding onto the ball after a big hit late in the game.

Big Ben: Not an outstanding game from a statistical standpoint, but no major mistakes. And just let me say ... I LOVED the intentional grounding call. It sucked to get the penalty, but feeling pressure, Ben threw the ball away. THANK YOU BIG BEN!!! He's learning to play smart. It's about time.

Haley: Listen up, Steelers fans. I'm going to tell you right now why Haley is 1,000 times better than Bruce Arians. Forget every individual play call throughout the game. As usual, most games are decided in the fourth quarter. With the Steelers up by 10 points early in the fourth, the Steelers controlled the ball for 10 minutes and finished the drive off with a touchdown. Think about that ... they killed 10 minutes off the clock AND scored more points to put the game away. In five years with Arians as OC, how many times do you remember the Steelers offense putting a game away like that? Game Ball Todd Haley.

Clark: Based on what I saw, no one on defense stood out enough to get a Game Ball. If I had to give one, I'd give one to Ryan Clark because of a few nice hits.

Goats

I have only one goat this week. I thought about not giving one, but I'm doing it anyway.

Tomlin: We're up 17 points late in the fourth quarter. Why the hell is A. Brown back receiving a punt?? That makes absolutely no sense to me.

Agreed with everything Wally, except for one thing:

Ben went 24-31 275 yards and two touchdowns with a 125 QB Rating. I'd call that an outstanding statistical performance, even in today's passing NFL.

bayz101 wrote:

Agreed with everything Wally, except for one thing:

Ben went 24-31 275 yards and two touchdowns with a 125 QB Rating. I'd call that an outstanding statistical performance, even in today's passing NFL.

OK, I didn't see any stats. That's a lot better than I would have thought based on what I saw.

GAME BALL
Ben Roethlisberger
Ryan Clark
Van Dyke (ST's)

GOAT
Defense for the way they played in the first quarter

my game ball has to go to the offensive line.....what was it, a ten minute drive that put the nail in the coffin? I was impressed with the whole offensive unit....but the O-line deserves a shout out after that performance...

Goats.....Sancheesey and the refs....how much more of the horrid officiating will it take before they bring back the NFL refs??? enough already.....Can't really say we got a lot of pressure on Sancheesey, he was just missing wide open targets, at this rate he will be behind Tebow on the depth chart by the end of the season.....

one more thing...that PI called on Taylor, when Clarke dismantled Holmes was the absolute worst call I have ever seen....it was almost like "well Clarke hit him to hard, not sure it was defenseless receiver, but we gotta call something" type deal....unbelieveable

Oooh, one more Game Ball ...

Rex Ryan: Tim Tebow gashed us on two consecutive plays. For whatever reason, we do NOT have an answer for Tebow. Congrats to Rexy for taking Tebow out of the game and putting Sanchez back in.

One other GOAT goes to Phil Nantz for calling Sanchez, Roethlisberger late in the game when Sanchez through the ball OOB with about 2 minutes to go.

Player of the game - Heath Miller. And that is as it should be. He would be all world TE on most other teams. They are finally starting to use him. Suck an egg Arians. Haley uses his personnel to their best advantage.

Goat - Casey Hampton and Keisel. What the heck happened to you and why are you playing so much? Getting gashed on runs right up the gut over and over.

Additional Game Ball to lvsteelersfan for this quote: "Suck an egg Arians."

stlrtruck wrote:

One other GOAT goes to Phil Nantz for calling Sanchez, Roethlisberger late in the game when Sanchez through the ball OOB with about 2 minutes to go.

Throw in Simms for not even catching it!!

stlrtruck wrote:

One other GOAT goes to Phil Nantz for calling Sanchez, Roethlisberger late in the game when Sanchez through the ball OOB with about 2 minutes to go.

i heard that. i kept waiting for him or someone else to correct him but it never happened

game ball: ben and his receivers

goat: refs for reasons already explained

defense still scares me though. had sanchez been accurate and/or the receivers able to catch the ball it might have been a different story

stlrtruck wrote:

One other GOAT goes to Phil Nantz for calling Sanchez, Roethlisberger late in the game when Sanchez through the ball OOB with about 2 minutes to go.

Jim Nantz.

Phil or Jim, doesn't matter...he's Goat Nantz now.

Truck is a Goat for getting Jim Nantz's name wrong while criticizing him for getting Ben's name wrong.

Wallace108 wrote:

Truck is a Goat for getting Jim Nantz's name wrong while criticizing him for getting Ben's name wrong.

And for having red hair.

Wallace108 wrote:

Truck is a Goat for getting Jim Nantz's name wrong while criticizing him for getting Ben's name wrong.