Pittsburgh safety Anthony Smith today told the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette that he guarantees a Steelers' victory on Sunday in Foxboro. It pains me to say it, but Smith went to Syracuse, so he really should know better.
From the story:
"We're going to win,'' Smith said today after practice. "Yeah, I can guarantee a win.''
Smith, a hard-hitting free safety who replaced injured Ryan Clark as the starter midway through the season, said he's not worried about any motivation he might be giving the 12-0 Patriots with his words.
"Now we have our swagger back on defense and we're playing great ball and they're playing great on the offensive side, too,'' he said of the Steelers. "I think we have a real good chance to win the game and we will win the game.''
Not only that, he said while New England's receiving corps of Randy Moss, Wes Welker and Donte Stallworth is good, it isn't as good as the one the Steelers played Sunday against the Bengals , featuring T.J. Houshmandzadeh, Chad Johnson and Chris Henry.
"I think we were facing great receivers last week too and we shut them down,'' Smith said. "Those three guys, I don't think it gets much better than Cincinnati's corps of receivers. We've already seen the best."
Smith added a little more lumber to the fire when he said New England's receivers haven't been hit the way they will be hit on Sunday.
"They said Baltimore was their most physical game but I think we hit harder than Baltimore, so they haven't seen nothing like us yet.
"They should be worried about us. We never worry about receivers. We're the ones doing the hitting. They have to run routes. We're attacking them, they're not really attacking us."
ESPN’s Monday Night Football averaged 12,529,000 homes (based on a 13.0 rating), breaking the record for household audience set last year when the network averaged 11,807,000 households for the New York Giants at Dallas Cowboys on October 23 (based on a 12.8 rating). The game was seen by an average of 17,522,000 viewers, breaking the record set by Disney Channel’s "High School Musical 2," which averaged 17,241,000 million viewers on August 17 this year.
ESPN out-delivered all broadcast and cable networks in prime time among households, persons 2+, and all key male and adult demo groups (M18-34, M18-49, M25-54, P18-34, P18-49, and P25-54). It was the third time ESPN has won Monday night overall; MNF has “won the night” in the male demos every week this season.
In Boston, the game delivered a 28.3 rating on ESPN and an 8.3 rating on WCVB-ABC, for a combined 36.6 rating. In Baltimore, the game delivered a 12.9 rating on ESPN and a 24.6 rating on WJZ-CBS, for a combined 37.5 rating.
The game’s audience peaked from 11:30 – 11:45 p.m. ET (the telecast ended at 11:49 p.m.) with a 17.6 rating, representing 16,920,000 homes and 23,865,000 people. For that quarter hour, ESPN’s share – the percentage of U.S. television homes watching TV that were watching ESPN – was 31.
Transcript: Mike Vrabel's conference call with Pittsburgh reporters
What’s Ohio State doing in the title game?
Hopefully not getting blown out. They’ve got some scores to settle with that SEC.
Do you guys have the Steelers number; you’ve certainly beaten them enough times?
No, I don’t really understand that or get that. I think we’ve always played them it’s certainly been big games. It’s been in a championship game or was the opener up here. When we opened our new stadium that was certainly a big game, it was I think a Thursday night game. Just the thing that I think about with them is that it has always been an important game or it’s been a big game and we’ve made the plays in those games to win.
A lot of us saw what the Jets did to the Steelers, Mangini used to coach with you guys, and people think that you can do the same thing with better players. Is that accurate?
Well, I think the thing that you have to understand about this league, which you guys know, is that it is a copy-cat league. The film is available to everybody and you look at the film and I’m certain that’s one of the games we’ll look at. Just as we’ll look at the Bengals game and the Dolphins game and right on down the line. You have to be careful with some of those games, that’s not quite reflective of their offense. Because it is an explosive offense and sometimes playing in those kinds of conditions you don’t really truly get to see what they are capable of. But, we’ll certainly look at all the film we can.
Any advantage in being in close games the last two weeks for you guys, Mike?
I think that not that you want to have them, but there are going to be close games in the league and you have to win games in the fourth quarter. Not that it’s good or bad but there used to be a day where that’s how we played. We played games, tight games, close games and we won them in the fourth quarter. That’s how this league is. There are tight games every week. There’s teams that have a chance to win with the ball and that’s how it comes down to.
You guys made it look so easy for most of the season. Does it help you winning those close games?
Yeah, I think helps anytime you are in a position to make plays and I said this earlier in the year that there are going to be opportunities where we are going to have to make the right plays and we are going to have to perform under pressure and make the plays down the stretch to win games. We’re not just going to be up by three or four touch downs. If you make a mistake it doesn’t cost you the ballgame. We did that, we stopped them and we were able to stop them when it counted and get the ball back and the offense was able to complete the drive.
What are some of the differences with this year’s Steelers offense compared to the Steelers you’ve played in the past?
I think the running game is obviously always prevalent. The thing I think that impresses me a lot, which they have done in the past, is that Ben’s been able to get out of the pocket. He makes a lot of plays out of the pocket. He’s very consistent. I know those plays aren’t designed but as soon as he is out of the pocket, those receivers know they have a chance to make a big play, or the tight end, if they get open or uncover from their guy, he’s able to find them.
Speaking of tight ends, do you enjoy that position as much as any?
Well, it's part of what I do. Its not a big focal point, but it’s situational football that we have to do, whether its goal line, red zone, two minute, things like that. It’s just situational football and it may be comes up a couple times a game, maybe it doesn’t come up, but I have to be prepared for it.
Is this the best New England team you’ve been on?
Well, it’s the most talented. I think that nobody can say that they have the best team they’ve ever had until the season is over, until the run through the playoffs and the Super Bowl. I would look back to San Diego last year and I’m sure they thought they had a really really good team but I think if you asked them after the season they would say that it wasn’t because you have to win a championship to be considered that good of a team.
How important is it to you guys to go undefeated?
It’s not what motivates us or not what challenges us. We’re trying just like everybody else is to get ourselves in a position for the playoffs. That’s what everybody does. And obviously by winning games, the more games you win, the better opportunity you have to get home field advantage, to get a bye. So those are the things we’re trying. We won our division and we have to just keep trying to check off goals.
What was your reaction to some of Baltimore’s claims about how the referees wanted you to win?
That would be a first for me that if I ever left the game thinking that the refs wanted us to win. I don’t really pay much attention to it. We’ve been in those positions before. We need to concentrate on the Steelers.
Why was Baltimore able to have such success running the ball, and how much of a concern is that going into Steelers this week?
Well, I think it is a big concern. If we don’t get those problems fixed, I would say that Pittsburgh runs the ball on average a little better than Baltimore does. So if we don’t fix the problems that we had, I’m sure it’s going to show up again on Sunday.
Does it all affect a legacy when the league ruled you guys were cheating?
No. We’ve moved past that and I don’t think it affects our guys on this team and how we prepare or how we try to go out and play.
In some way have you used that as a motivation at all?
Well, no, I think we are past that and we are moving on to other motivating factors, playing the Steelers and the way they are playing right now and the guys that they have on their team, that’s motivation enough.
Transcript: Mike Vrabel's conference call with Pittsburgh reporters
What’s Ohio State doing in the title game?
Hopefully not getting blown out. They’ve got some scores to settle with that SEC.
Do you guys have the Steelers number; you’ve certainly beaten them enough times?
No, I don’t really understand that or get that. I think we’ve always played them it’s certainly been big games. It’s been in a championship game or was the opener up here. When we opened our new stadium that was certainly a big game, it was I think a Thursday night game. Just the thing that I think about with them is that it has always been an important game or it’s been a big game and we’ve made the plays in those games to win.
A lot of us saw what the Jets did to the Steelers, Mangini used to coach with you guys, and people think that you can do the same thing with better players. Is that accurate?
Well, I think the thing that you have to understand about this league, which you guys know, is that it is a copy-cat league. The film is available to everybody and you look at the film and I’m certain that’s one of the games we’ll look at. Just as we’ll look at the Bengals game and the Dolphins game and right on down the line. You have to be careful with some of those games, that’s not quite reflective of their offense. Because it is an explosive offense and sometimes playing in those kinds of conditions you don’t really truly get to see what they are capable of. But, we’ll certainly look at all the film we can.
Any advantage in being in close games the last two weeks for you guys, Mike?
I think that not that you want to have them, but there are going to be close games in the league and you have to win games in the fourth quarter. Not that it’s good or bad but there used to be a day where that’s how we played. We played games, tight games, close games and we won them in the fourth quarter. That’s how this league is. There are tight games every week. There’s teams that have a chance to win with the ball and that’s how it comes down to.
You guys made it look so easy for most of the season. Does it help you winning those close games?
Yeah, I think helps anytime you are in a position to make plays and I said this earlier in the year that there are going to be opportunities where we are going to have to make the right plays and we are going to have to perform under pressure and make the plays down the stretch to win games. We’re not just going to be up by three or four touch downs. If you make a mistake it doesn’t cost you the ballgame. We did that, we stopped them and we were able to stop them when it counted and get the ball back and the offense was able to complete the drive.
What are some of the differences with this year’s Steelers offense compared to the Steelers you’ve played in the past?
I think the running game is obviously always prevalent. The thing I think that impresses me a lot, which they have done in the past, is that Ben’s been able to get out of the pocket. He makes a lot of plays out of the pocket. He’s very consistent. I know those plays aren’t designed but as soon as he is out of the pocket, those receivers know they have a chance to make a big play, or the tight end, if they get open or uncover from their guy, he’s able to find them.
Speaking of tight ends, do you enjoy that position as much as any?
Well, it's part of what I do. Its not a big focal point, but it’s situational football that we have to do, whether its goal line, red zone, two minute, things like that. It’s just situational football and it may be comes up a couple times a game, maybe it doesn’t come up, but I have to be prepared for it.
Is this the best New England team you’ve been on?
Well, it’s the most talented. I think that nobody can say that they have the best team they’ve ever had until the season is over, until the run through the playoffs and the Super Bowl. I would look back to San Diego last year and I’m sure they thought they had a really really good team but I think if you asked them after the season they would say that it wasn’t because you have to win a championship to be considered that good of a team.
How important is it to you guys to go undefeated?
It’s not what motivates us or not what challenges us. We’re trying just like everybody else is to get ourselves in a position for the playoffs. That’s what everybody does. And obviously by winning games, the more games you win, the better opportunity you have to get home field advantage, to get a bye. So those are the things we’re trying. We won our division and we have to just keep trying to check off goals.
What was your reaction to some of Baltimore’s claims about how the referees wanted you to win?
That would be a first for me that if I ever left the game thinking that the refs wanted us to win. I don’t really pay much attention to it. We’ve been in those positions before. We need to concentrate on the Steelers.
Why was Baltimore able to have such success running the ball, and how much of a concern is that going into Steelers this week?
Well, I think it is a big concern. If we don’t get those problems fixed, I would say that Pittsburgh runs the ball on average a little better than Baltimore does. So if we don’t fix the problems that we had, I’m sure it’s going to show up again on Sunday.
Does it all affect a legacy when the league ruled you guys were cheating?
No. We’ve moved past that and I don’t think it affects our guys on this team and how we prepare or how we try to go out and play.
In some way have you used that as a motivation at all?
Well, no, I think we are past that and we are moving on to other motivating factors, playing the Steelers and the way they are playing right now and the guys that they have on their team, that’s motivation enough.
We've just gotten word from ESPN that Monday night's Patriots-Ravens game was the most-watched program in cable history, topping the numbers put up by Disney Channel's "High School Musical 2" earlier this year.
We'll give you exact numbers when we get the release.
Transcript: Bill Belichick's Wednesday press conference
Just a quick rundown here. We got back late Monday night, so we’re going to change the schedule a little bit this week and get back into our normal deal tomorrow. [We’re] just trying to catch up a little bit today. Getting ready for the Steelers – this will be a big challenge for us. They’re very good at everything – good on offense, good on defense, real good skill people in the kicking game. They do an excellent job. They’re a very physical team. They play hard in all three phases of the game, they’re obviously well-coached and defensively they pretty much do it all. They lead the league in points and they’re good against the run, good against the pass, good on third down, good in the red area. They have a lot of three-and-out drives. Their production out of our their front seven guys…The Bengals are a team that has been scoring a lot of points and Pittsburgh shut them down twice. I think that’s an indication of how well they play. Offensively, the Steelers run the ball well and they run it more than anyone else in the league. They’re good on third down, they’re good in the red area. [Adrian] Peterson has a lot of long runs and a lot of yards. [Willie] Parker is second in the NFL to Peterson in most of those categories. I know [Hines] Ward is obviously tough. [Santonio] Holmes is a big-play guy, [Heath] Miller has been very productive for them at tight end, [Najeh] Davenport’s given them some quality snaps at running back behind Parker. Of course, you know, Ben [Roethlisberger]’s an excellent quarterback, a hard guy to tackle, big physical, keeps a lot of plays alive with his scrambling ability. We have a lot of things to get ready for this week -- [Allen] Rossum as a returner. They’re a physical coverage team, just like they are on defense. We have a lot of things to get ready for, [a] short week, and we’ll try to utilize our time the best we can to try to make sure we get all our bases covered by Sunday.
Just to double check, the guys are not practicing today?
Right.
Is that an acknowledgement of the short week and the three straight primetime games? Do you sense the guys dragging a little bit?
That’s just where we are. We have a lot of things that we’re going to cover and walk through. We’ll be on the field tomorrow.
You mentioned Willie Parker and what he’s done. Can you give a little breakdown? Would you describe him as a hard-hitting back between the tackles or a guy that can get outside?
He can pretty much go anywhere. He’s fast, he’s explosive, he’s a good inside runner, a good outside runner, he’s got excellent speed so he can turn a short run into a long one. He’s not a three-yards-in-a-cloud-of-dust guy. He’s fast, he’s athletic, plays well in space and he’s got good power.
Can you talk about the Steelers secondary in general, and Ike Taylor specifically?
Taylor primarily plays on our right being a big, physical kid, [a] good tackler, strong, physical on the line of scrimmage. In regular, the shakedowns and plays on the other side for him, Deshea {Townsend] moves into the nickel position in sub when [Bryant] McFadden comes in the game. Of course, their safeties – [Anthony] Smith and [Troy] Polamalu or [Tyrone] Carter, who’s been there for Polamalu a little bit the last couple of games -- they’re all physical, they’re all fast and they cover a lot of ground back there. It’s an overall fast secondary, physical, [a] hard-hitting group. Like I said, Taylor’s really the perimeter corner on everything and Townsend plays outside when there’s two corners in the game. When there’s three corners in the game, then he moves into the slot.
As a follow up to that, there are a lot of big-name corners out there. Taylor’s name hasn’t been mentioned with a lot of the elite guys, but he’s had a very good year so far and the Steelers have been tough. Do you have any observations on his play?
Just what I said. He’s big, he’s physical, he’s a good tackler, he’s strong. The Steelers play a lot of zone coverage, so you don’t see them in a lot of man-to-man situations. Some on third down. But that’s their style of play and I think he plays it well. I mean, their whole defense plays well.
Are you proud in any way that given the number of blowouts that that didn’t lull your team to sleep, that they’re still able to play situational football in crunch-time and execute these last two weeks? In a lot of the games you’ve played previously, you didn’t need pinpoint execution late in the game because you were already up by 35?
Each game has it’s own plays and points to it, so some of those games we went out and executed some things very well early, got some turnovers, put points on the board, took advantage of field position and so forth. This was a game Monday that there was less of that and it came down to some situational plays at the end of the game and we were fortunate to make a few more of them than they did. As you said, it was some of the different plays that some similar elements from Philadelphia, or even going back to Indianapolis. Each game is it’s own entity. We just have to deal with whatever the circumstances and the situation [are] in that particular game and try to execute it to the best of our ability.
Did you ever worry that in the blowouts the guys would lose the ability to do that, or were you confident that when it was called upon to make crunch-time plays late in the game that you never forget how to do that just because you’ve won some big, blowout games?
As I said, I think it came up in the Indianapolis game a month ago. Down by 10 with 10 minutes to go – that’s playing from behind. There were elements of it in that game and then two games later against Philadelphia, we’re down again in the fourth quarter. I hope we don’t make a habit of that. I think it’s harder to play the game that way, but [it’s a] complement to the players that they were able in those situations to make those plays, but it really requires that you make just about all of them and there’s not much margin for error when you put yourself in that situation. Fortunately, we were able to make them this week, but it’s not the optimum situation to be in. It’s not where we’re trying to be.
Can we revisit the situation with the kickoff at the end, the unusual one where it was at the 35-yard line? I’m just curious, what would have happened if Steven [Gostkowski] had kicked it out of bounds? Would they have had the option to have you re-kick? Would they have gotten it at the five yard line, and has that ever come up? I know you talk about situations a lot. It just seemed very unusual.
Yeah, I don’t think I’ve ever seen it come up. The rule would have been a half the distance to the goal line penalty, so it would have been on I guess the 17 and a half.
It was obviously an emotional game. Some of the Ravens were talking about the referees wanting the Patriots to win and all of that kind of stuff. Do you have any reaction to that kind of talk?
No, we’re focused on what we’re doing.
Can you talk about defending the Hail Mary at the end of the game? Eric Alexander made the key tackle down there. Is he normally in your Hail Mary defense, or what was the idea of having him back there?
Well, the situation wasn’t quite as clear-cut as what sometimes it would be. There were eight seconds to go in the game and the ball was on…I think it was Baltimore’s 45-yard line. Probably if they’d gotten the ball to the 30, they would have had an opportunity to attempt a 50-yard field goal, and so that’s only 25 yards. So, with eight seconds, you definitely would have time to run a deep sideline route or maybe a short corner route from the slot-receiver, that kind of thing. Get out of bounds and either kick a field goal or be throwing a Hail Mary from maybe the 40-yard line or the 35-yard line, instead of from the minus 45. You can pick up some yardage there. So we had to defend the 15-20 yard kind of pass, too, with only eight seconds to go, as well as the deep one. We were back there, we defended the goal line. If the ball was caught in front of it, like it was, and tackled, then the game’s over. That’s obviously what happened. We were trying to go up for it. There was definitely some contact down there, but in any case, the idea was to set a fence on the goal line if the ball was thrown in front of us and make sure that they didn’t get it in. Our players were in the end zone, expecting the ball to come down further in the end zone, where we would definitely need to play it and obviously not let them catch it in the end zone. If they catch it in front of us and allow us to tackle them, then that would still be a successful play in that situation, and that’s kind of how it worked out. But it wasn’t a clear-cut Hail Mary situation. They didn’t have to do that with eight seconds to go, but they did it. Had they gotten it a little bit closer, then I think the ball would have come down in the end zone instead of short of it.
The skill is as the ball is coming down, but then once the ball is in his hands, is that just pure luck? Is there anything you can coach the guys to do, other than just swat it down?
Well, yeah, I think there’s a lot of coaching involved in the play. You don’t want everybody jumping for the ball, or if it gets tipped, you don’t have anybody on the guys standing around getting the tip. There’s also a chance that you could knock each other off, so you’d want to keep it clear so your jumper that can go up and get the ball can go up and get it. Again, part of the problem with that play was one of our players that was trying to jump, wasn’t…There was quite a bit of contact there and [he] wasn’t able to go up.
Getting back to the day off from practice today, is it kind of more a product of the three night games in a row and the players needing a rest or a break?
No. No. After a Monday night game, it’s a shorter week and we feel like this is the schedule that gives us – The bigger part of the problem is not, I think, practice with the players. It’s for the coaches to be ready for the players when they come in here. As I said, Pittsburgh is a hard team to prepare for. What you don’t want to do – What I don’t think you want to do is give your team a game plan and then you do more work on the team [and] find out, well, this isn’t quite what we want here and we need to change this and we need to change that. We felt it was just better to take a little more time ourselves from a coaching standpoint, a staff standpoint, to make sure that with the extra time we had this morning that we could get things as close to exactly the way we want them so when we do give them to the players that we don’t have to go back and change them. There are always little adjustments that you make, but so you don’t have to go back and make a lot of major changes and adjustments in your game plan, when you start you’re headed in the right direction and you don’t have to change that course during the week. That’s not a good position to be in, in terms of preparing your team. We’ll get a full day in here, we’ll get a lot done what we normally get done on Wednesday and then we’ll move on to Thursday tomorrow and we’ll be ready to go on Thursday.
I believe this is the fourth team you’re playing this year with a first-year head coach. Does that at all factor into the time it takes you guys to prepare?
I mean, each team has it’s own elements that you have to prepare for, from the coaches to the players to the coordinators to all of the other things that affect the game. In terms of your preparation, you put all of those things together and figure out what you want to do. But each team is unique, each team is hard to prepare for. There are a lot of things that you have to deal with and you try to analyze all of them and then sort it out and figure out what you want to do. The Steelers are obviously a very good football team. They’re good in all three phases of the game. They’re playing very well right now and they’re a huge challenge to get ready for. Mike [Tomlin] has done a great job with the team. The players are good, the coaches are good, they have good coordinators, they’re sound, they’re tough, they’re well-disciplined. That’s why they’re 9-3.
I know Tomlin came from a 4-3 background. Have you seen elements of that in Pittsburgh’s defense or are they still pretty much strictly 3-4?
I think they’re basically running the same defense they ran previously when Bill [Cowher] was there and when [Dick] LeBeau was the coordinator. They’ve carried it over to LeBeau as a coordinator and kept it pretty much in tact from what it’s been. I don’t see a lot of difference from what they did last year, defensively.
We've just concluded a conference call with Patriots coach Bill Belichick, as there is no media access at Gillette Stadium today.
For the most part, Pats players have the day off, but Belichick indicated that there will be some walkthroughs and classroom work as the team prepares for Sunday's game with Pittsburgh.
Though several players said after Monday night's game in Baltimore that physically they were spent after three consecutive prime-time games, Belichick said the time off for the players was not to give them rest but to give the coaches time to prepare a game plan for the Steelers.
"The bigger part of the problem isn’t the players but for coaches to be prepared when the players come in here. Pittsburgh is a hard team to prepare for, and we felt better to take time ourselves from coaching standpoint to get things as close to exactly the way we want them so when do go back to the players we don’t have to make major changes," he said.
The players will be back on the field tomorrow.
Though the Steelers have a new coach, Mike Tomlin, whose background is with the 4-3 defense, Belichick said he hasn't seen much difference in the team's defense because Tomlin retained defensive coordinator Dick LeBeau and the 3-4 system they were using under Bill Cowher.
We will have conference calls with Steelers' running back Willie Parker and Tomlin shortly.
