NFL Week 17 reactions and overreactions

Your weekly look at the Pittsburgh Steelers and the NFL.

Talking some NFL football.

1. If you had told me at the start of the season that the Pittsburgh Steelers vs. Baltimore Ravens game in Week 18 would be for the AFC North crown in a winner-take-all, loser-go-home game I would have said, yeah, that sounds about right. I just never imagined this would have been the path for it to reach this point.

The Steelers pretty much had the division won on two different occasions.

They had a three-game lead early in the season over a 1-5 Ravens team.

They let that slip away.

They regained the division lead by beating Baltimore, in Baltimore, and then opening up a two-game lead in the division with two games to play where a win in Cleveland, against a three-win Browns team, would have clinched the division.

They let that slip away into their current situation.

2. If you had also told me the Steelers would go on a three-game winning streak against Baltimore, Miami and Detroit, and then lose to Cleveland in Cleveland, I would have also said, yeah, that sounds about right.

It also would not be surprise me if they show up on Sunday night and win after losing to Cleveland. All of this is just what the Mike Tomlin Steelers do.

3. The manner in which the Steelers lost to Cleveland on Sunday was entirely infuriating, even when it was entirely predictable. The Steelers simply do not win in Cleveland anymore. They have now gone winless in their past five games against teams more than eight games under .500 (impossible!). Bad weather. No wide receivers. I woke up Sunday morning expecting a loss. It was just maddening to watch it unfold.

Their top two wide receivers were out of the game, and they lost tight end Darnell Washington in the first quarter. Despite that, they completely ignored Pat Freiermuth until the final drive of the game. They also ran Jaylen Warren 12 times on a day where he averaged over five yards per carry, and attempted more than 40 passes and under 30 runs on a day where they averaged more yards per carry than yards per pass. This has been a common theme all season.

Why did they not use Freiermuth more?

The Washington injury is also going to be significant. He is their most effective pass-catching tight end. He is their best blocker at the position by a mile. Him being out means more Jonnu Smith, and that is simply not a good thing. He has been a total bust and been non-impactful in the passing game and he is a complete liability as a blocker.

Why were Warren and Kenneth Gainwell, consistently their two best offensive playmakers this season, a bigger part of the game plan? Especially with bad weather and the team trying to remove Myles Garrett from making an impact?

What makes the Freiermuth thing even more baffling was the fact Cleveland was playing most of the game with a middle linebacker that was clearly injured and playing on one leg. The other middle linebacker was Devin Bush.

Whether that was a play-calling thing or an Aaron Rodgers thing is up for debate. It might have been both.

4. The thing that makes me lean toward a Rodgers thing is that he targeted Marquez Valdes-Scantling NINE TIMES, including on the final three plays of the game while he was matched up against Cleveland’s best cornerback (Denzel Ward).

What are we doing here, man.

Valdes-Scantling, by the way, caught three of those nine passes for 21 yards. Just a brutal showing.

This is also where we need to discuss how the Steelers were even IN that position. DK Metcalf was serving the first of his two-game suspension for going after a fan in Detroit. Calvin Austin was injured. It was at that point the Steelers’ insane plan at wide receiver finally bit them in the ass. Even more than it already has.

Think of the sequence of events that had to happen here with the wide receiver position.

It would be hilarious if it was not so frustrating. Or stupid.

• They have ignored the wide receiver position for two years and not had an adequate option in that spot.

• They traded their previous No. 1 wide receiver (George Pickens) because he was an inconsistent, unreliable mad man that nobody ever knew what he was going to do next.

• They replaced him with a new, more expensive No. 1 wide receiver, giving up a higher pick (a second-round pick) than what they received for the previous No. 1 wide receiver (a third-round pick).

• Then the new guy did something even more insane and reckless (going after a fan) than the previous guy and got himself suspended for two of the biggest games of the regular season.

• The previous No. 1 wide receiver had a better season with his new team.

Incredible stuff.

If the Steelers end up losing the division there is going to be plenty of blame to go around. The coaching staff will have to own a lot of it. DK Metcalf will have to own a lot of it. The front office will have to own a lot of it, especially for its overall neglect of the wide receiver position and assembling any quality depth there.

Now, let’s talk about the rest of the NFL, including potential chaos in the NFC South, tanking for draft position and the AFC playoff picture overall as a whole.