If there was one thing the Pittsburgh Steelers set out to do this season, it was to be different than the past several years. You don’t have to look any further than their flurry of moves this past offseason to see that.
Yet after a promising start to the year, they’ve fallen back into the same rut of years past. The Steelers are now on another mid to late-season losing skid and currently lose out on the division lead to Baltimore via a tiebreaker. According to former Raven Chris Canty, the way the Steelers’ season has spiraled is embarrassing.
“The Pittsburgh Steelers rolled out a 41-year-old Aaron Rodgers, who they waited on throughout the entirety of the offseason. This is the guy that Mike Tomlin handpicked, and said, ‘You know what, he’s gonna be the one to help us change this trend of losing postseason games,’” Canty said Tuesday on ESPN’s First Take. “For the first month and a half of the season, it sure looked like it. The Steelers got out to a 4-1 start. Now they’re looking up at the Ravens in the standings. It’s an embarrassment for Pittsburgh.”
Canty has long held the belief that the Steelers weren’t true contenders this year. He went as far as declaring it an “all-time” collapse if the Steelers didn’t hang onto the division back when they were 4-1. Unfortunately, the Steelers are proving him right as of late. After that start he references, they’ve now won two games out of their last six. With Baltimore being 1-5 back then, it would have been hard to believe the teams would have the same record just a month and a half later.
The Ravens have taken advantage of an easier schedule, but they deserve credit for winning the games they need to. It isn’t pretty, but they’re handling their business while the Steelers certainly are not. Now, the Ravens’ schedule does start to tighten up, with matchups against both New England and Green Bay remaining as well as the two against the Steelers.
However, that doesn’t mean much for the Steelers and their own tough schedule. They have to play Buffalo this Sunday, and the Ravens the week after. To be fair, they have beaten contending teams this season, with wins over the Patriots and the Colts. Yet, if they were to lose both games, things could get really ugly. At that point they’d be 6-7 heading into Week 15. A pit that’s extremely hard to come out from and could dash their playoff hopes altogether.
Yet, there’s a reason they play the games, and the Steelers could come out victorious. For the sake of their season, they really need to. Just over .500 and tied in terms of record for the division, the time is now to get out of this funk. If they can’t in the next two weeks, the Steelers’ season might be just about over.