Can the Steelers play the wild card? Don’t bet on it

By Darrell Laurant  |   Thursday, December 21, 2006  |  Comments( 3 )

Pittsburgh Steelers
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The long odds say they won't be the Pittsburgh Stealers again this year.

Last season, Bill Cowher's team all but swiped the AFC title after slumping in midseason. This time around, it would take a miracle of B-movie proportions to pull it off again.

The Steelers aren't dead yet, but they're six feet under. And seven teams -- Cincinnati, Denver, the New York Jets, the Jacksonville Jaguars, the Tennessee Titans, the Buffalo Bills and the Kansas City Chiefs --- are in position to throw dirt on their faintly flickering wild card hopes.

Pittsburgh is 7-7, as are Kansas City, Tennessee and Buffalo. The other four are 8-6.

Obviously, if the Steelers win out while everyone else loses their last two, they're in. Of course, it's not that simple. For one thing, it can't happen.

Cincinnati plays Denver and Buffalo faces Tennessee this week, while Jacksonville and Kansas City meet in Week 16. So three of those six teams will have to win at least one of their two remaining contests.

The only real hope for Pittsburgh is to finish in a three-way tie with Kansas City and Cincinnati (which means the Steelers will have to beat the Bengals in Cincinnati on New Year's Eve). In that case, the defending Super Bowl champions would lose the tie-breaker to fellow AFC North member Cincinnati (they would tie head-to-head and in conference record, but the Bengals would have the edge in "records in common games"), yet trump the Chiefs by having beaten them earlier in the season.

And as if that wasn't bad enough, Pittsburgh has arguably the toughest last two games of the final AFC eight, facing Baltimore this Sunday and then the Bengals on the road.

Still, Baltimore -- having already clinched its division -- would like to win Sunday. The Steelers MUST win. Plus, they'll be at home, backed by thousands of Terrible Towels.

At one point, "terrible" also described how Pittsburgh was playing, with QB Ben Roethlisberger throwing more interceptions than touchdown passes and the defense strangely vulnerable. Now, Mo Mentum is wearing black and gold.

In the words of a current Jimmy Buffet song: "Don't try to explain it, just nod your head. Breathe in, breathe out, move on."

Oddly, the more players Pittsburgh loses to injury, the better the Steelers seem to play. Cowher's men have won three straight, outscoring the opposition 84-16 and allowing just one touchdown over that stretch.

This week, however, an already overloaded offensive line received another blow when tackle Max Starks tore a ligament in his knee. Either Trai Essex or rookie Willie Colon will start in his place against Baltimore.

Joey Porter still isn't quite himself, although Roethlisberger finally seems to have cleared his head from a couple of concussions (one from a car, the other from Atlanta DE Chauncey Davis). WR Hines Ward has been in and out of the lineup, center Jeff Hartings' knee has betrayed him, two DBs are out. And on top of everything, there are all the rumors swirling around Cowher -- will he step down at the end of the year and become head coach of the Carolina Panthers to be closer to his new home in Raleigh?

It's all too complicated, especially the playoff picture. An exchange from Steeler beat writer Ed Bouchette's weekly Q&A feature says it perfectly.

Questioner: "I think Tennessee could help us in a three-way tie with Jacksonville, because they would knock Jacksonville out. Not sure though if Tennessee would be ahead of us or not (same conference record). I need a beer to figure this out."

Bouchette: "Get me one too."
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