UGH. I don't know what's worse -- the Pittsburgh Steelers losing to the New York Giants in a game we could have won, or the New York Giants dismissively laughing at the Steelers' play. Well, actually, I do know -- it is clearly the latter. As a result, I would politely ask the NFC East to light up the New York Giants and stomp all over them, since we won't have a chance for revenge during the regular season. I'm serious. Stomp, gouge, rip and shred.
Grrrr. I am so not in a forgiving mood right now. Also, the New York Giants are moving on The Rant's Football Loyalties chart. You'll now find them under the "Teams I Abhor" section, one spot below the Dallas Cowboys. Giants delenda est. Unless they are playing Baltimore. Or Indianapolis. Or New England.
OK, I feel a little better. Stupid Giants.
One does wonder, though, just what the problem is with Pittsburgh's offense. Pittsburgh's defense, as usual, played very well during yesterday's contest, and holding the Giants to 21 points isn't bad at all. The goal-line stands against their offense were extremely impressive. So you can't pin this loss on the defense. The offense, though -- my God!
Would someone kindly explain to me why our offense fell apart? I mean, is it too much to ask that our offense -- particularly our coaches who specialize in that field* -- figure out the NFC East is brutal in terms of its pass rush and attack on a quarterback, and adjust accordingly? It was one thing to have the Eagles stomp us into tiny bits; that could be dismissed as a one-off. But now that it's happened twice, one can't just say, "Oh, well, they outplayed us." No. We have to figure this out. So if that means we have to put an extra guy on the line, or run the ball 90 pc of the time, or whatever -- then do it.
Annoyingly, this comes just as the AFC North got a lot tougher. Oh, sure, Cincinnati is 0-8, but Cleveland is 3-4 and Baltimore is 4-3 and both these teams look angry. We can only hope Cleveland beats Baltimore next week, allowing us to rise two games above both, but I hate having to rely on the Brownies for anything. Plus, if Cleveland gets too good, they could conceivably threaten us, and that would be bad. It would be even better if Cincinnati would manage a win against Cleveland or Baltimore. True, that's just a hope and a prayer at their point,but who knows? The Bengals are "efforting," according to the team, so maybe they'll do Pittsburgh a favor.
No, I did not make that up. That's what the headline said. "Efforting." Without the quotes. Crikey, even the Bengals' writers are incompetent.
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* As a fan, I have to say I find Bruce Arians maddening, if only because he's inconsistent. Some weeks, he looks like an absolute genius who can do no wrong. Other weeks -- to borrow from a comment I saw on M Go Blog this week -- Arians looks like a 15 on a scale of 1 to stupid.
Actually, I switched over to the Steelers-Giants contest in the 3rd quarter of the Bengals' game -- unable to watch the horrific scene in Houston any further. . . . It proved to be a day-brightener. How I relished watching the Steelers twisting slowly in the wind.
Cordially,
The Bobcat
Posted by: The Bobcat at October 28, 2008 07:48 AM