Learning the hard way 

By Mike Batista

Steelahs.com travel secretary

December 10, 2007

(Editor's note: Click here for a photo gallery from Sunday's game at Gillette Stadium)

The whiz-kid luster of Steelers coach Mike Tomlin might be wearing off. It might be time to look past the meteoric trajectory of his career and unearth some of his shortcomings.

Instead of derailing the Patriots' pursuit of perfection Sunday, the Steelers stood and watched as the 2007 Patriots
bullet train whizzed by. The Patriots improved to 13-0 with a 34-13 rout at Gillette Stadium in Foxborough, Mass.

The Steelers still had a pulse early in the fourth quarter. Trailing 31-13, they had a third-and-goal at the Patriots' 1-yard line. A touchdown would have made it a two-score game with more than 13 minutes remaining. But Roethlisberger threw an incomplete pass to Santonio Holmes in the corner of the end zone. Then on fourth down, Hines Ward was stopped short on an end around, giving the ball back to the Patriots. The Steelers had two chances to ram the ball in from a yard out and get back in the game, but they got fancy and came away with nothing. Either Tomlin or someone on his staff made those two baffling play calls.

In the second quarter, the Steelers seemingly had the momentum after scoring a touchdown to cut the Patriots' lead to 14-10 and forcing a three-and-out. But William Gay muffed the punt, giving the Patriots the ball at the Steelers' 34-yard line. The Patriots didn't score, but the Steelers still wasted a possession. Coaching has at least something to do with that kind of lapse.

And then there's the good ol' guarantee. You might have heard that Steelers safety Anthony Smith guaranteed a win over the Patriots on Wednesday. Not only that, but he said the Steelers already faced the best receivers in the NFL in the Bengals' Chad Johnson, T.J. Houshmandzadeh and Chris Henry, even though Randy Moss, Wes Welker and Donte Stallworth loomed.

Smith has played with a lack of discipline and sportsmanship on the field, and he showed a lack of respect for the unbeaten Patriots off it with his guarantee. Tomlin needs to foster a culture in which players are more careful about what they say off the field and, in some cases, what they do on the field.

Tomlin has the potential to be a great coach. Right now, he's still learning.

His counterpart, Patriots coach Bill Belichick, is normally more guarded with his words in press conferences than Fort Knox. But he opened up on Sunday, firing back at Smith after the game, saying "We've played against a lot better safeties than him, I'll tell you that."

Ouch.

That's like being scolded by Moses as he holds the Ten Commandments tablet.

And more than one Patriots player, including Tom Brady, verbally rapped Smith on the knuckles with a ruler by referring to this as a lesson learned.

The rain that was forecasted for Sunday night finally began falling at the end of the game, and chants of "Guarantee! Guarantee!" rained down along with it.

The Patriots acted like they weren't fazed by Smith. But we know damn well that in Team Evil's inner sanctum, Smith's words were fueling a motivational bonfire.

Instead of a 27, Smith might as well have had a target on his back. He's one of the reasons why on two Patriots' touchdowns, it looked like the closest Steelers defender was in Providence. Early in the second quarter, he bit hard on Tom Brady's play-action fake, which allowed Moss to break free for a 63-yard touchdown catch to increase the Patriots' lead to 14-3. In the third quarter, Brady lateralled to Moss, who dropped the ball but still had time to lateral across the field back to Brady, who launched a 56-yard touchdown pass to Jabar Gaffney. Smith desperately threw his hand up but couldn't knock the ball from its path into Gaffney's arms. That touchdown increased the Patriots' lead to 24-13, and the Steelers never got closer than 11 points the rest of the way.

The Patriots are six wins away from becoming the first NFL team to finish a season 19-0. If they do that, it would be hard to argue against them being the best team ever.

The Steelers? They're a good, but not a great, team.

The Patriots' 21-point margin of victory understates the talent disparity between the teams. The Steelers kept the game close for a half, trailing 17-13 at halftime. But the Patriots could have led by more if they didn't drop a few passes and miss a field goal. Even with butterfingered receivers, however, Brady's greatness couldn't be surpressed. It seemed like he made at least three quarters of his completions a split second before a Steelers pass rusher closed in on him. When the Steelers lost the ball on downs at the Patriots' 1, the Patriots had to take some time off the clock. No running game? No problem. Brady kept the clock going by completing short pass after short pass, dissecting the Steelers' No. 1 pass defense like a surgeon.

As far as the Steelers go, when Najeh Davenport's your biggest deep threat, it's never a good sign. Davenport scored the Steelers' only touchdown when he caught a Roethlisberger pass on a busted play in the second quarter.

For the time being, the Steelers can't look in front of them. They're not close enough to the Patriots and Colts to try to catch up. The Steelers have to look over their shoulder and try to hang onto that No. 3 seed in the playoffs. They have a chance to post perhaps their most impressive victory of the season next week when they host Jacksonville. The Jaguars and Steelers are both 9-4, although as long as the Steelers win the AFC North, the Jaguars can't finish with a higher seed because the Colts have wrapped up the AFC South.

Nonetheless, this will be a good measuring stick for the Steelers because they'll be up against the caliber of team they're likely to face in the first round of the playoffs. Then they'll have a chance to rectify their road woes when they finish the season at St. Louis and at Baltimore.

Beating teams they might see in the playoffs and learning to win on the road is a realistic to-do list for the Steelers. Beating the Patriots is too hard for them right now.