Since hockey season is not quite here I'll continue writing about the currently 2-0 Steelers. Last night we beat the hapless Browns, once again. It was a close game, though, and therefore was a showcase of the finer points of football such as coaching, time management and decision making. In several key moments, the most important action was taking place not on the field, but underneath the glorious, well-groomed hair of Mike Tomlin and behind the catfish-like face of Romeo Crennel.
Late in the second quarter, with Cleveland driving towards a momentum-shifting touchdown, Romeo and his band of overrated jocks screwed up as any good Brown would, by not calling a time-out opting rather to try and run a quick play. The play went nowhere and took valuable time off the clock that could have been used to take an extra shot at the endzone. i'm not complaining that they erred, nothing pleases me more than Cleveland failing, I'm just saying that one poor decision changed the course of the rest of the game considerably. Imagine if the Browns could have had another chance to score, there may have still been a glimmer of hope for a win.
This wasn't the only key decision either and the Browns are not the only team to make a bad choice at a crucial time in the game. If you saw the game you may remember that the Browns were inexplicably still in the game with just a few minutes remaining in the fourth. The Steelers were trying to run out the clock and the Browns were low on timeouts. Naturally, we gave the ball to Fast Willie Parker to get a first down and keep the clock going. Parker broke through the first line of defense and probably should have fallen down at that point, making sure he stayed inbounds. For some reason, maybe he thought he saw more daylight than there was, he kept going and the clock was stopped with a little more than two minutes left. Had he stayed in the clock would have ticked down to the two minute warning and the Steelers would have a seemingly easier time to kill the remaining time. Instead, the Browns had about 30 seconds to try for a miracle. It would have taken nothing short of a miracle, indeed, but stranger things have happened.
Luckily, stranger things didn't happen this time and the Steelers were victorious. The problem with that is it did require a bit of luck. And you can't rely on luck in a close game in bad weather...you have to make the right decisions when given the chance.
