What happened today

For the 5th time this season, we lost by a field goal after blowing a 4th quarter lead. We have only played 12 games. If we want to be generous and include the second Cinci loss in this category (in that one, we blew a THIRD quarter lead, and lost by TWO field goals) then we're 50/50: win, or bullshit loss that looked like a win.

It's easy to say those losses "should have been" wins, but I'm not sure that's true. The truth is, when you play it close, there is only "could have been"-- for both teams. Both teams "could have" lost, both teams "could have" won. Last year we went 5-1 in games where the margin of victory was 5 points or less. This year we're 1-7. It could have been that this didn't happen and that this did. That's the funny thing about tight games in any sport: anything could happen, and over a large enough sample size, everything does happen in about even proportions.

I'm not going to say this is pure luck, and that somehow we're just recessing to the mean. There's also skill involved in a huge way. Last year's D wasn't simply lucky: it was lucky and hella talented on just an epic magnitude. This year's D is unlucky and fielding less talent.

Finally, I'd say there's a sum-of-the-parts effect at work, where the talent and luck, or lack thereof, align and amplify a team's fate. We saw this with the Titans when they were down on their luck: mostly the same roster as the one that went 13-3. Everything about last year's team just clicked and complimented and built on itself, just as everything about this year's team contributed to the total implosion.

Ugh... enough theorizing. Let's just leave it at this: our roster hasn't been completely replaced by incompetent impostors; these are the same guys, and they are still capable of regaining their previous form (even if it may be too late to matter).

Okay, so what went wrong today:
1. Bad offensive play calling
2. Bad defensive execution

Those were the killers.

Special teams didn't cause me stress. I've got plenty to say about them, but not right off the bat. First we need to talk about Bruce Arians and the 11 guys on defense. (I'm still very angry, so everything that follows may not be entirely cohesive.)

BRUCE ARIANS IS A DUMB MOTHERFUCKING DIPSHIT PUS BRAIN BULLSHIT BUTTMUNCH FART HEAD COCKSUCKER IDIOT.

I remember being irritated with him when he first took over in 2007. I remember being irritated with him at the end of last year, and being very nervous going into the playoffs that he'd fuck things up. Turns out he did very well for himself in that run. He also behaved fairly well for the first half of this season, but ...today. Today was a new land speed record for stupid, as measured in miles per hour.

Let's review: Ben had been out because of a head injury. The Raiders have the worst run defense in the league. Mendenhall has been on a tear, where he's been giving you a decent (bordering on STELLAR) 5.0 y/c this season. He just came off a game in which he stuck it to the Baltimore run defense, and completely carried an inexperienced, backup QB on his shoulders.

Now, back to Arians: I don't mind if he wants Ben to get in his throws; I wouldn't even mind if he had Ben set up the run with the pass. What bothers me is how many times Ben was asked to go 5-wide, empty set. WHAT THE FUCK????? Those huge passes to Tone and Ward... those came out of sets where Ben had a check down coming out of the backfield. I mean seriously... WHAT THE FUCK????? We don't even have 5 guys worth lining up as receivers!!! After Ward, Holmes, Wallace, and Miller, you have Spaeth, Sweed, and Mendenhall/Moore. Spaeth is a total non-factor when he's the 5th target behind those other 4 guys. Sweed can't catch. Mendenhall/Moore are fine receiving backs, but there's absolutely no advantage to putting them on the line of scrimmage and telegraphing the pass!

Empty backfield was bullshit #1. Bullshit #2 was the lack of running when running was the correct thing to do. Running was the correct thing to do all day, on every down.

The scouting report on the Raiders is that they lead in tackles for losses and also allowing the most rushing yards. It's either feast or famine with them. If they stop you, just run at them again.

Let's look at the record on designed runs:

2nd-5, OAK14 14:26 R. Mendenhall rushed to the left for 1 yard loss
1st-10, PIT28 8:30 R. Mendenhall rushed to the right for 3 yard gain
2nd-7, PIT31 7:52 R. Mendenhall rushed up the middle for 4 yard loss
2nd-4, PIT26 4:10 R. Mendenhall rushed to the right for 60 yard gain
1st-10, OAK14 3:19 R. Mendenhall rushed up the middle for 4 yard gain
2nd-6, OAK10 2:38 R. Mendenhall rushed to the right for 5 yard gain
3rd-1, OAK5 1:56 R. Mendenhall rushed up the middle for no gain
4th-1, OAK5 1:15 B. Roethlisberger rushed up the middle for no gain
1st-10, PIT26 8:11 W. Parker rushed to the right for 5 yard gain
2nd-5, PIT31 7:36 W. Parker rushed to the left for 9 yard gain.
1st-10, PIT45 7:15 W. Parker rushed to the left for 1 yard gain
1st-10, OAK29 1:53 M. Moore rushed to the right for 7 yard gain
1st-10, PIT20 11:07 R. Mendenhall rushed to the right for 3 yard gain
2nd-7, PIT23 10:27 R. Mendenhall rushed up the middle for 6 yard gain
3rd-1, PIT29 9:51 R. Mendenhall rushed up the middle for 4 yard gain
1st-10, PIT33 9:13 R. Mendenhall rushed to the right for 3 yard gain
2nd-7, PIT36 8:34 R. Mendenhall rushed to the right for no gain
2nd-3, PIT49 4:51 R. Mendenhall rushed to the right for 2 yard gain
3rd-1, OAK49 4:05 R. Mendenhall rushed to the right for 2 yard gain
2nd-5, OAK42 2:48 R. Mendenhall rushed to the left for 1 yard loss
1st-10, OAK29 1:44 R. Mendenhall rushed to the right for 2 yard gain
2nd-8, OAK27 1:01 R. Mendenhall rushed to the left for 2 yard gain
1st-3, OAK3 7:13 R. Mendenhall rushed to the left for 3 yard touchdown.
1st-10, PIT47 4:46 R. Mendenhall rushed to the right for 8 yard gain
1st-10, OAK21 3:25 R. Mendenhall rushed to the right for 2 yard gain

Yes, that 60 yarder helped the average. No denying it. But, as I already said, the beauty of the Oakland Raiders is that they're good for allowing more than just one big play, if you give them enough chances.

7 times where we had 4 or less yards to go; we went 4 for 7 converting on those runs. I'm starting to hate this argument that Mendenhall "can't gain the tough, short yards when they're needed." It's made by people who call in to radio shows; the same people who put a lot of stock into shit stats like RBI and game winning goals. The bottom line is this: Mendenhall is legit in any situation. Yes, he got stuffed on 3rd and 1, after running for 4 and 5 yards on the previous two plays. On 4th and 1 you either have to give him the ball again, OR kick the field goal. I like risking the 3 points for the chance to have 7; I don't like risking the 3 points and my franchise QB's skull for the chance to have 7, especially when my running back is averaging 3 y/c on the previous 3 plays.

On another 3rd and 1, Mendenhall gained 4 yards. On a 2nd and 3, he gained 2 yards, followed by a 3rd and 1 where he gained 2 yards. On 1st and goal from the 3 yard line, he rushed for a TD on his first try. There is simply no truth to the idea that he can't bust it up the gut when the chains need to be moved. If it seems like that's true, it's because our play calling consistently tends to shy away from pounding the football in short yardage situations.

I'll never understand our redzone trip at the end of the second quarter, where we get to the Oakland 22-yard line with 1:19 left, 3 timeouts, and it's 2nd and 3. 22 yards to the goal. 1:19 left. Timeouts coming out of our ears. 3 yards to move the chains. What do we do? Pass for 6 yards to Wallace, setting up at the 16 with 0:59 left. Okay. 16 yards to the goal. Great. One minute left. Our running back is averaging like 8 yards a carry. We can stop the clock. We can either get a big gain and shave some seconds off the clock to precisely where we want it, or we can get stuffed, stop the clock and pass the ball another 2 or 3 times. The beauty of running in this situation is that it keeps the defense honest. Naturally, we go 5-wide, and they put every defensive back on their team in the endzone, where they pick Ben off. Luckily we still had our timeouts, so we were able to force them to punt so we could then run the clock down with a knee.

!!!

Let me make this disclaimer: second-guessing the play calling is always much easier than actually calling the plays. But it absolutely feels like we got away from the basics this week, we got away from smash-mouth, running football, even after it looked so good in Baltimore.

Do I think the passing game was excellent? Yes, kind of. Excellent results, but that had much more to do with the Raiders, and not as much to do with the play calling. The lack of Heath (1 catch), and that 145 yards of Ben's 278 came on only 4 plays doesn't scream mastery. If that was a legitimate thing, a thing his coach was calling and Ben was executing at will, then they'd do what Peyton Manning and his crew do: score a lot more points than the other team ever could hope to score. Instead, it felt like a fluke series or two. It felt like this was a team that was flat, and didn't have an identity, and was just relying on latent ability to put up points.

I think it speaks to that lack of offensive identity when we lose in time of possession to the Oakland Raiders. Yes, the passing was fine, yes the running was fine... but we struggled all day to put together a dominating series.

I'm not sure that firing Bruce Arians is the key. It may be. But offensive coordinators in general are going to irk us Pittsburghers. We're neurotically committed to a style of football that was successful for about 25 years, and is now very antiquated. If we got our way, the leading rusher would be the fullback, and we'd hide two of the greatest WRs ever in the shadows of a power run game.

The bottom line on Bruce, as far as I'm concerned: I like his playbook, I like some of his theories on offense, and I don't think he's hurt any of his players development (and in fact, I'd say he's improved some from where they were under Cowher/Whisenhunt); however, he's consistently failed to establish an identity for this offense in the last three regular seasons. (I guess they had an identity last regular season, which was as damsel in distress, constantly requiring the D to do butt-crazy things to bail out the offense.)

What I like about Arians' is his interest in loading up multi-dimensional options for Ben. Mendenhall is a very west-coast style player, in that he can receive, and he can rack up huge yards in a single-back set. Lining up Heath and Holmes and Ward in the bunch, or bringing in Wallace for 3-wide formations, I like that, too, because Ben is a good enough passer to juggle 4 check-downs at a time. It also means that Mendenhall has the advantage of rushing against a defense that is preoccupied with receiving threats. I like this "spread 'em out" philosophy with our personnel. The difference between this group of skill players and the Colts or Pats, isn't what they can do, but how they do it. There still seems to be this tentative vibe with everything our offense does. Sometimes we run no-huddle because we need to change pace, or sometimes we don't run no-huddle because we think maybe we need to go back to something else because maybe no-huddle wasn't exactly working. Sometimes we do a 2 play, 80 yard passing drive for a TD because we want points. Sometimes we go three-and-out in a random part of the game, but not before wasting a timeout because we fucked up on the play clock.

If you've ever seen the Colts play, you understand what I'm getting at. Indianapolis runs their offense with military-like precision. Every route is run crisply, so that Manning doesn't even have to look, he can just time out where his guys will be. Every play is rehearsed and drilled and then scripted, so that the players can run up to the line of scrimmage and know exactly what's going to happen without having to talk about it. The Colts have an incredibly defined identity, but past that, I don't think they have any more talent than us. Nor do I think they have a better playbook than us. Just one that everyone on the team has read and knows by memory.

Bruce Arians is probably fine as a coach, and he's even good at scripting plays, but no one has really established a protocol for how our offense behaves, and him being the O-coordinator, that's where the blame ends up going.

See: the Chargers-Steelers divisional playoff game from last year; that was a brilliant example of methodical, deliberate, scripted playcalling. That's what we need to do every week.

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I've said enough for now. Tomorrow we'll cover the defense and how much it betrayed our trust, once again.