Excuses

[BengalszoneBilly]

The defense is largely predicated on him.

That's a lot of eggs in one basket.

Yeah... and the Bengals offense is largely predicated on Cedric Benson. In fact... just based on the stats, Benson is far more important to the Bengals than Troy is to the Steelers.

...Just saying.

I hear ya', but with Benson out, the Bengals fared far better than did the Steelers without Troy.

[agreen_112]

Steelers and Ravens fans are (were in the case of Ravens fans - their boards are a beautiful read right now btw) stuck in the past. As was mentioned earlier about their record under Cowher - he's long gone. Not only is this a new Steelers team but it's a new Bengals team.

And a thing of defensive beauty it is. Dudes...I've been a Bengals fan since their inception in 1968, and I've NEVER seen them play this way. It's always been about the offense. Always have to out score the other team. Well that s**t is over. Playoffs here we come!

That's so funny you say that Billy, my dad said the exact same thing...

[Sea Ray]

The Bengals won the game because their defense stopped the Pitt offense.

Speaking of, why with 2 minutes to go did Big Ben try to throw long 4 straight times? He's supposedly a 2 min guy and should know better. That's not how you run a 2 minute offense. You complete 2 or 3 ten yard passes and then see where you stand. His play there played right into the Bengals hands.

[jjakq27]

My bet is they still think they're the better team

They're gonna have a hard time reconciling that. We played their brand of football, and won. They can start that Polamalu crap, but we have worse injury woes than they do.

Maybe if they had a real field he might not have gotten hurt in the first place. And the Steelers used to complain about PBS....

[skyline]

You want excuses? From Ben's post-game interview:

Q: Was this a day when it felt like things just weren't quite there, and if you had hit on a big play that maybe things would have turned out differently?

Yeah, we took some shots. We moved the ball down the field a couple of times. There was just something missing all day. And I don't know what it was.

Q: Could you sense that at all?

Oh, yeah, even from the get-go. Something was weird about the day. I don't know if it was the weather in November or what it was. But it seemed like even the crowd at the beginning – everyone was just kind of different. No excuse. We need to play better.

[DC_Bengals_Fan]

I don’t know if it was the weather in November or what it was.

Translation: I'm a fat bastard. I'm on Lendale White's 'tequila and burgers' diet. I pound a couple of 40s of Old English every day. Bottom line is, if it's more than 50 degrees outside I start to get the sweats and the shakes. And those 1PM starts too, man, I'm still hungover. Who's reading defenses with a skull-splitter? I see 3 open receivers but they all have the same number.

And lemme tell ya, it's hard to hit open receivers when you can't see straight, the ball's slippery, and your arm feels like a noodle. So gimme a damn break.