Steelers @ Bills. Monday, January 15th at 4:30pm.

[SWATeam]

2 minutes ago, K-9 said:

I hope McD got a good look at Von’s tuneup game for the playoffs after sitting him last week and makes the smart decision to put Miller in moth balls the rest of the way. Might as well play 10 on defense for all of what Miller brings on the field at this stage. 

 

And the moment Bryant gets healthy, send Poona back to the inactive list as well. 

Poona has been good

[ColoradoBills]

3 minutes ago, TheBrownBear said:

A couple of early season blowout losses and a three game stretch with Mitch Trubisky will do that to you.  They are +37 over the past three weeks.

 

 

Rudolph has 3 passing TDs in 3 games.  The 2 in the Bengals games were for 86 and 66 yards.  I'm thinking the safety shell will keep

that from happening.  23 points home victory against the Bengals skews that.  7-point victory over Ravens 2nd stringers and 7 points over the 

sea chickens are the other 2. 

[K-9]

1 minute ago, SWATeam said:

Poona has been good

Sure, he’s been better than the load of crap he was playing like early in the year, but Bryant brings more to the table imo. 

[bills6969]

The Steelers advantage is they are playing with house money. They squeaked into playoffs when no one expected them to. All the pressure is on us to win.

[TheWeatherMan]

Steelers are the only team in the AFC to make the playoffs with a negative point differential.  We are playing at home and they are expected to be missing their MVP.  
 

I personally think this is the worst team in the playoffs.  Losing this game would be a major upset! 

[PBF81]

11 minutes ago, TheBrownBear said:

A couple of early season blowout losses and a three game stretch with Mitch Trubisky will do that to you.  They are +37 over the past three weeks.

 

23 of that 37 were against the Browning-led slumping Bengals in a home game though.  

 

Other than that they played a mediocre Seattle team and the Ravens JV team with Huntley.  The Seahawks and Bengals rank 25th and 21st in scoring D.  We rank 4th.  

 

Either way, make of it what you will.  The point is that historically on this season they're not a great team.  They barely edged the 9-8 Bengals, Jags, and Colts to log that 7th seed.   

 

The matchup seems to favor them however, the cold snowy weather in high winds.  They do seem to have a good secondary so there may not be much wiggle room for error on Allen's part, and if it comes down to which team runs the ball better, Cook who's averaged 3.6 YPC under Brady except against Dallas or Harris/Warren who are bigger backs, given that our rushing D is our weakness, it may be problematic.  

 

 

Edited January 8 by PBF81

[Generic_Bills_Fan]

Just now, ColoradoBills said:

 

Rudolph has 3 passing TDs in 3 games.  The 2 in the Bengals games were for 86 and 66 yards.  I'm thinking the safety shell will keep

that from happening.  23 points home victory against the Bengals skews that.  7-point victory over Ravens 2nd stringers and 7 points over the 

sea chickens are the other 2. 

18/20 for 134 yards when one of those plays was a 71 yard td against the ravens is the most nonsensical stat line I’ve ever seen.  Without that play (which assuredly would not have happened with Kyle Hamilton playing) he was 17/19 for 63 yards lol 

[Draconator]

 

[LABILLBACKER]

12 minutes ago, Warcodered said:

It did, by the end of it was so frustrated that we didn't let him throw it earlier.

You do realize the wind doesn't care how strong your arm is. It's going to blow the ball off course to some degree. Especially with how the wind swirls at Highmark.  For this particular game if it is 20-25, you gotta run and be willing to checkdown to pass plays under 10 yards.

[nucci]

2 hours ago, Einstein said:

It’s officially playoff week!

 

TJ Watt, the Steelers best player, is NOT expected to play.

 

 

For the Bills:

- Rasul Douglas left the game with a knee, but was seen celebrating in the locker room. Could be he was simply removed from the game due to an abundance of caution. 

 

- Ty Johnson is in the concussion protocal.

- We don’t know much about Gabe yet.

 

- Dodson is a probable AC joint sprain according to BangedupBills on Twitter.

 

- Dawkins said his finger almost FELL OFF. I don’t know if that’s hyperbole or not, but we all saw the blood.

 

 

you don't keep a player out of a must win game for caution.....especially an abundance

2 hours ago, Einstein said:

This will be the Steelers 3rd road game in a row. Gotta think that wears on the team a bit:

 

 

Bills made it to the Superbowl as a wild card team on the road...plus not a really long flight from Pit to Buffalo

[ColoradoBills]

2 minutes ago, Generic_Bills_Fan said:

18/20 for 134 yards when one of those plays was a 71 yard td against the ravens is the most nonsensical stat line I’ve ever seen.  Without that play (which assuredly would not have happened with Kyle Hamilton playing) he was 17/19 for 63 yards lol 

 

Thank you.  That just adds to my observations.  Stop the run and keep the passes in front of you.

[SWATeam]

2 minutes ago, LABILLBACKER said:

You do realize the wind doesn't care how strong your arm is. It's going to blow the ball off course to some degree. Especially with how the wind swirls at Highmark.  For this particular game if it is 20-25, you gotta run and be willing to checkdown to pass plays under 10 yards.

Good.  Because all Rudolph seems to be able to do is loft them deep to Pickens

[nucci]

1 hour ago, Logic said:

Bad weather, going against a good defense and an underdog team with nothing to lose and a 3rd string QB...

To me, this has all the makings of an anxiety inducing, closer than it needs to be, can't exhale until the final whistle type of game. Not that the Bills have really played any other type of game for most of this season, but...

I hope I'm wrong. I hope it's a laugher in favor of the good guys. As it stands now, though, I'll say 20-17 Bills.

 

what do you mean they have nothing to lose? It's a playoff game they can lose

[RoyBatty is alive]

28 minutes ago, LABILLBACKER said:

Yeah that arm really cut threw that wind in that NE game 🙄

It sure as heel wasn't Josh's fault.

 

We got WILDLY outcoached by Belichek,  what did mac jones, complete 3 Passes?  How do you lose a game like that, coaching.  Now in THAT particular game i blame it squarely on two people, McDermott and the OC for not using our QB competitive strength until the game was almost  too far gone and THEN Allen started to throw it.

Edited January 8 by RoyBatty is alive

[BADOLBILZ]

3 minutes ago, SWATeam said:

Good.  Because all Rudolph seems to be able to do is loft them deep to Pickens

 

Pickens didn't have a pass thrown his way last game and yet they won.  

 

So that would be incorrect.    

[Warcodered]

8 minutes ago, LABILLBACKER said:

You do realize the wind doesn't care how strong your arm is. It's going to blow the ball off course to some degree. Especially with how the wind swirls at Highmark.  For this particular game if it is 20-25, you gotta run and be willing to checkdown to pass plays under 10 yards.

Josh was able to throw the ball in that game, they didn't do it until they had no choice and then it was like oh I guess he could have done it after all.

[Dillenger4]

The Steelers have a better D than Miami. Miami was "injured" last night and they gave us fits at times. I expect this playoff game to be a barn burner, low scoring game. Our main issue is Cook. He can't run up the middle vs good, beefy D lines like last night, like vs NE and the Steelers have a great line. Ty Johnson is most likely out - so it will be Cook, Lenny and Murray. That scares me.

Hope for Josh runs being effective and short passes to Diggs/Shakir/Kincaid. Steelers are no joke boys....

[Generic_Bills_Fan]

1 hour ago, FilthyBeast said:

I hate these large point spreads and I still feel the Bills will make this game way more difficult than necessary even without a superstar like Watt playing for the Steelers especially since Rudolph is a much better '3rd stringer' than Skyler Thompson last year.

 

With that said, if Allen and this offense don't turn the ball over they likely win without needing the game going down to the final drive and minutes of the game. If not expect more of the same....and even heavier anxiety and dread heading into a possible divisional round match up against a familiar team.

I think people don’t really conceptualize point spreads that right way…they see the -9.5 on paper next to the smaller spreads for other games and theyre like oh wow the game won’t even be close but in reality you can have a 10 point game that’s really competitive the whole way 

 

to go a step further, -9.5 means they think they’ll get even betting between people thinking the bills win by more than 10 and people that don’t.  It doesn’t really mean Vegas thinks we’ll win by 10.  

 

it’s a big spread by nfl standards but when you compare it to those ‘alright this one team doesn’t have much of a chance’ type college games that are usually in the 20s it isn’t anything like that 

[LABILLBACKER]

7 minutes ago, SWATeam said:

Good.  Because all Rudolph seems to be able to do is loft them deep to Pickens

I hope the reindeer is dumb enough to attempt a bunch of deep throws. It will favor our safeties. Josh completed 15/30 during that NE wind storm. There was no advantage. Hopefully the wind is under 20mph and we can take a couple shots. But the prudent strategy is run, throw short and no turnovers.

[RoyBatty is alive]

Just now, Warcodered said:

Josh was able to throw the ball in that game, they didn't do it until they had no choice and then it was like oh I guess he could have done it after all.

Agreed.

 

I vividly remember how giddy Belichek was after the game, he knew damn well that the better team lost and he stole one away from McDermott.  That is one game I will never forget.  One game I can never forget and blame is on McDermott.  Much like the KC-Bills game fiasco under Rex Ryan where he made multiple blunders including two poor challenges and two challenges he should have called.  Then the blowhard after the game stuck his foot in his mouth when he said after being an NFL HC for 7 years, didn't how how the replay cameras worked on challenges.  I was permanently done with Rex immediately after that.