Steelers MMQB: NFL Week 13 Wrap Up
By Kim Myers
What We Learned in Week 13 In the NFL:
- Minnesota is the latest team to get Tebowed
- The Dolphins roll over the Raiders as Palmer can’t shake off the Bungle stank
- The Giants gave the Packers their closest shot at losing a game but failed to seal the deal
- The Ravens can actually win a game vs. a lesser opponent following a big win
- The Steelers show Cincy who’s boss in the AFC North
December football seems to have a whole different feeling to it. It’s where the teams that intend to be playing in January start to separate from the pack. There are usually late game comebacks, overtime finishes, and plays that you want to watch over and over again. Some teams will rise to the occasion, and the others will fail miserably. This week there were some teams definitely on the rise and others failing very miserably.
One team not failing miserably is the Denver Tebows. It should be no surprise any longer that this guy can win games. Personally, I don’t care if he’s praying to the spaghetti monster each time he scores a touchdown, he is exciting to watch and his defense is playing inspired football. My favorite part of each of his wins is hearing all the NFL “experts” scramble around finding reasons why he couldn’t do this again. Thanks to the Raiders collapse in Miami yesterday, the Broncos now share the lead of the AFC West division in December.
Carson Palmer can’t seem to wash off that Bungle funk he’s got all over him as the Raiders were dominated in Miami. Miami is playing as if they were trying to secure a playoff spot when clearly it is out of reach for them at 4-8. (Possibly a team like Philadelphia should take notes as to what it looks like to play professional football from the Dolphins) Here’s a shocker, Richard Seymour, Raiders defensive tackle was ejected from the game for throwing a punch as the Dolphins drove to score and go up 27-0. All of Steeler Nation remembers him getting tossed from the Steeler game last year for connecting on a punch to the face of Ben Roethlisberger. From that incident, Seymour was fined $25,000 and was eligible to play in the following game. In light of the fact that this is his second offense and what just transpired with Ndamukong Suh, I’d say a suspension is in Mr. Seymour’s future.
So the Packers are 12-0 and the Giants gave them their best chance of a defeat but fell short. Mr. Elite, Eli Manning led the Giants down the field to score and Bradshaw ran in for the 2 point conversion to tie the game at 35-35 with less than a minute on the clock. Unfortunately, that was more than enough time for Aaron Rogers to connect on just 4 plays to get the Packers in field goal range for the game winner as time expired. Nice job Eli, we were counting on you. Go make Peyton a sammich now.
Much to everyone’s surprise the Ratbirds were able to put up impressive stats and a victory against a lesser opponent following an emotional win and yet another Gatorade bath of their coach. Not sure if the win in Cleveland earned Harbaugh another shower from his team, but they sure looked stoked to be able to finally beat a team that has a losing record. We can only hope now that they built up all of their emotions to be able to get passed the Brownies and they’ll have nothing left in the tank against the 0-12 Colts next week. It could happen, right?
The Steelers played the first total 60 minutes of football of their entire season on Sunday, putting the Bungles in their place in the AFC North and the league as a team that looks like they could be good in the future, but can’t pull out a win against good teams yet. Right off the bat the Bungles had a touchdown called back due to a false start penalty on AJ Green and then a field goal attempt was pushed back for a delay of game penalty, with the subsequent kick blocked by Cameron Heyward and ball recovered by Ryan Clark. The Special Teams splash plays didn’t end there as Antonio Brown added the Steelers first punt return touchdown in their last 78 games.
The defense played every bit of what we know and love them to be. James Harrison had a monster game with 3 sacks on the Ginger and Polamalu, was wreaking havoc on just about every play. Ike Taylor caught his second interception on the season and the Bungles offense was held to just 135 passing yards. The penalties story was a whole different one than Steeler fans are used to as well with Cincy making the most mistakes and missteps getting penalized 10 times for 109 yards.
Some very important milestones were reached in this game including Hines Ward becoming the 19th receiver in NFL history with 12,000 yards on a 12 yard catch up the middle, a trademark Ward play. Ben also passed Terry Bradshaw for the most completions as a Steeler, earning the record much quicker than Bradshaw had. Harrison also joined Mike Merriweather and Chad Brown as the only Steelers with at least two 3 sack games in the same season. LaMarr Woodley made his return but quickly exited for his hamstring again, although stating that he could have come back in the game if needed and wants to play this Thursday night at home against Cleveland.
So there’s a short week to get ready for the Brownies but the Steelers are looking like we all hoped they would coming off of their bye. The offense is clicking. With or without impressive rushing yards Mendy got 2 touchdowns and Ben threw for another under 200 yards passing but had 2 touchdown passes himself. The defense is ferocious and the Special Teams is creating plays. Ain’t no stopping us now, let’s just hope the Ratbirds falter somewhere in the next 4 weeks so the Steelers can earn a bye. Bring it on Week 14!
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