Ehwmatt wrote:Enigma869 wrote:YoungJRNY wrote:The BIGTIME difference was Mendenhall's turnover.
While I don't disagree with you that Mendenhall's turnover was big, it wasn't the reason that the Steelers lost this game. As I said previously, it was miraculous that the Steelers were even in this game. The Packers did everything (namely dropping pass after pass) they could to allow the Steelers to hang around. Pittsburgh never once led and in my opinion, Ben is THE REASON they lost that game. He simply didn't play well and made far too many huge mistakes for his team to win the game.
This game has to fall back primarily on Ben. Losing Woodson should have given Ben a decent chance to make some things happen, and he just couldn't do enough. Dishonorable mention goes to the reigning Defensive PotY, Polamalu, who was shockingly ineffective not just last night, but throughout the whole playoffs. The guy is great, but he is injured far too often for my own tastes.
Point blank, the Steelers came out shaky, flat and completley uninspired. When they did get something going or even REMARKABLY going in for a go ahead score, they gave the ball away almost every time. They did NOT feel like the Steelers last night playing armchair quarterback AT ALL. They were rushed, they were slow, they were not in position and the defense played like it did in 2009. I expected the Steelers to play their brand but unfortunately for me, they didn't come anywhere CLOSE to it and let Green Bay take advantage of a very poor performance.
Coming back from 18 down was impressive, that just goes to show how good and resilient this Steelers team really is. They are never down, they are never out and even though they don't look pretty, they will always have a shot to win the game at the end. It's just GB played very solid and you can't whiff like that, in the Super Bowl, against any team playing with that kind of solid-ness. Pittsburgh played the way GB should of but it was the other way around. GB played calm, collective, confidence, ready and executed. Hats off to them.
That said, it was one helluva season. Getting to the big stage was an incredible feat considering noone even picked us to be even second within our division, let alone take the Conference. I'm very proud and very happy that all you could ask for is to just get to the big game and ANYTHING goes. ANY team could be beat and it just wasn't Pittsburgh's night. I can deal with it, Green Bay just didn't play mistake football.
It was fun. I enjoyed everybody I had over last night as well as coming to this board and breaking things down. Great NFL season, love GB's franchise and their tradition. I am very happy for their fans.
I'm going out to get a new Stillers jersey today in honor of a great season.
