I’m very cautiously optimistic about the remainder of our schedule. The Ravens in Baltimore to close out the year could be meaningless, or for the division, or it could decide whether we make the playoffs and entirely meaningless to Baltimore. Completely up in the air.

Our remaining games are:

Cardinals (home)

Patriots (home)

Colts (away)

Bengals (home)

Seattle (away)

Baltimore (away)

The Cardinals/Patriots aren’t “must win” games, but there those kinda games that you sorta have to win to prove you’re not inept. Also they’re both in Pittsburgh. Same with the Bengals round 2. In theory we should be able to win all three. Depends if we shoot ourselves in the foot along the way I suppose.

Colts/Seattle are teams that I feel like we’re relatively evenly matched (although historically we’ve done well against Indy). Historically against west coast teams we’ve done bad playing in Pacific time. I’d call this a split.

Baltimore’s the wildcard. If they’ve got the division or even 1-seed locked up they may rest their starters…but they have a rough schedule ahead of them. Bye, Rams, Jaguars, 49’ers, Dolphins, and then us. The Rams are the easy team on that schedule…

There’s a good chance we end up finishing the year in the 10-7 or 12-5 range. But, before I buy fully into the hopium I want to see the offense display some level of continuity. The Cardinals aren’t great; we had better be able to build upon the performance we put out last week. If we can do that and then follow through against a basically dead-in-the-water Patriots team…we should be looking at a Wild Card spot at minimum.

I need to see the team perform well against two bad teams first…but last week was so exciting to watch, and it hasn’t been exciting in so long.

Offense looked night and day different. The team MOVED THE GODDAMN BALL! Need to work out the kinks though; DJ needs to sell the catch better in the endzone…like I get that it technically was a catch, but it’s hard to get behind that when the ball popped out the second he hit the ground. Warren needs to not fumble. Offense needs to not get pushed out of FG range by sacks/dumb penalties. We had 3 drives that were within FG range that ended in zero points. Fumble and penalties that pushed us out. If we get 9 points from those drives, this game would never have been close. We got the yardage, now we need the points to match it. Hopefully vs. the Cardinals that will be something we can figure out.

Defense looked overall slightly less incompetent in the secondary level…aside from Chase winning every damn tip drill. Watt had 2 sacks and 1 really dump fuckup. Needs to be mindful of that.

Overall I’m honestly a little shocked at how solid the team looked. The offensive production was a breath of fresh air. I expected improvement with Canada’s firing, but not instant gratification. Kenny still had some misses, but not as many. Perhaps that’s because he’s being utilized more in a way that better harmonizes with his strengths and weaknesses. Still needs to stop doing that stupid blind spin move. Middle of the field was open again thanks to Muth. Thank the heavens.

Solid win over a divisional opponent.

Pat “on fire” Freiermuth

Hell of a contested catch by Muth there.

There is no time in Ba Sing Se Cincinnati.

I’m just going to assume before clicking that it’s some variation of Randy from South park with the entire person/computer/room covered in jizz.

Edit - did not disappoint.

IDGAF - this is the best I’ve felt the Tuesday after losing to a division rival. That failure of a drive to end the game taking only 14 seconds off the clock. That was the final nail in the coffin.

God is real. Humanity wasn’t a mistake. We are free.

I had completely forgotten about Landry Jones.

Sounded (and looked) like someone got a hand on the XP kick…

I will not apologize for ugly wins.

I will dread them and they will shave years from my life.

But I will not apologize for Steeler football.

Sorry, Pittsburgh Steelers fans, but we’re about to get into a lot to talk about with the hierarchy of the AFC North and it’s best to get this out of the way: Your team isn’t going to maintain this.

We know but hey.

FR tho - it’s going to be really funny if we actually do make something out of this and a whole lot of people have to eat crow. Those of us who have watched the games know what kind of football team we have (or don’t) but it’s still funny how teams give us juuuust enough leeway to drag them down with us and we inevitably do.

If our offense turned the ball over more we’d be absolutely boned.

Meatball express…I fucking love it.

Anyone know a good way to listen to the game…? I have the Steelers app so can listen to the radio through that but I have to start it BEFORE the game starts or it’ll say I’m out of network.

Mile wide comet.

My grandfather passed away in January 2011. Between services at the funeral home there were a few dozen of us packed into a small room watching the Steelers Ravens game. We’re all pretty sure Grandpap was in there with us.

I know I’m a homer, but Ben seems like a sure fire lock to me. Two SB wins, a third appearance. The only QB in the group above with that many is Brady.

I think Rivers gets in before Matt Ryan. Rivers played 2 more seasons, they have similar yardage, Rivers has the edge in touchdowns, and Rivers has a 0.558 record where Ryan has 0.532.

I know Ryan has a Super Bowl appearance where Rivers does not, but that didn’t end all too well for Ryan. Reads like a black smudge.

That said, I wouldn’t be surprised to see Ryan and Rivers both get in. Just may take a while.

Eli would be surprising…

OK - first play…if DJ catches that it’s probably a TD.

After that first play our offense utterly collapsed into a black hole until just before half time with the 93(?) yard drive that ended in a missed 61-yard FG that never should’ve been a 61-yard FG. It was at this time that KP died along with it what scant hopes and dreams we had for the remainder of the game.

The field conditions were…not ideal. Not sure if that contributed to Minkah’s injury, but DJ was out there slipping like he wasn’t wearing cleats.

To those of you saying that Kenny Pickett is not the answer, I say, you may be correct. You know who else is also not the answer? Mitch Turnover Trubisky. Lastly, I love Rudolph as a backup and all, but he’s essentially the same as Mitch but with less arm strength.

Minkah is out with a hamstring injury vs. the Titans and probably for the following week vs. the Packers. If not more. Our secondary is tertiary at best. JPJ honestly looks pretty convincing. But everyone else back there looks like hot fucking garbage most of the time. People are so wide open I could throw to them.

I have nothing bad to say about our pass rush. We were in the backfield most of the game. Please keep doing that, yes.

Our offensive line looked much worse yesterday.

Now onto the most important position - the guys in zebra stripes fucked us harder than…someone help me out here; I’m trying to describe it without sounding too gross. “We got fucked” doesn’t cover it, but the entire first half was the most inconsistent officiating I’ve seen in quite some time.

You can’t call RTP on the T-Law hit but not call it on the Kenny Pickett hit when he actually fucking got hurt and it was essentially identical. Get that shit the fuck out of here. The “offensive offsides” was honestly even more brutal. Bad enough that Boswell went ahead and called out the hot garbage.

From there we move onto the final bullet point for the Jags games. The fans. I haven’t been annoyed by fans that much during a losing contest in I don’t even know how long. Would we have won with competent officiating? I don’t know. Honestly? If the officiating had been on point and we did win I know it would’ve been an absolute nail-biter and I think it more likely to be a close loss than win.

Bottom line - I’m going to shit all over the Jags when they lose next time. Even more so if there’s bad calls. Play stupid games, win stupid prizes.

Come on man…I’m not old.