Steelers: Pittsburgh looking forward

It’s been a rough week for the Pittsburgh Steelers.

A Sunday that was supposed to be the start of something special ended miserably, and far worse than anyone could’ve ever imagined.

The game against the Bengals was by far the biggest game of the season so far, and was huge in the fight for the AFC North. Fans were hyped to see Ben Roethlisberger return from injury to paired up with Le’Veon Bell, Antonio Brown, Martavis Bryant, and the whole gang for the first time, sans Maurkice Pouncey.

It all started out just as fans wished for. Ben Roethlisberger marched down the field and tossed a pretty touchdown to Antonio Brown. The celebration by Brown exemplified the exact response by fans as he threw his arms into the air, thankful to have Ben back.

It all seemed perfect. The ultimate combination. Keith Butler was revolutionizing a young defense that has been surprisingly strong, and now the offense was ready to explode as promised. But of course, it was too perfect. The football gods could not stand for football perfection for more than 20 minutes, and swiftly brought it to an abrupt end.

Tragedy struck.

Le’Veon Bell went down with a season ending MCL tear, and has now officially been placed on the Injured Reserve. The young superstar has been the heart of this offense, crushing defenses in all facets of the game with his patience, quickness, and explosiveness.

With the air sucked out of Heinz Field, the offense flustered, and the defense fought triumphantly, but eventually fell, allowing the Bengals to steal away the victory.

With this loss, the Steelers now stand at 4-4, and now sit behind both Oakland and New York in the wild card race, with the division pretty much out of reach already. Without key players, and every one seemingly dropping like flies, the Steelers season has been troublesome, and almost seems lost.

But it’s not over, yet.

Even without Bell, the Steelers are set up with an array of weapons, and are by no means one dimensional. In the first two games of the season, back up running back DeAngelo Williams backed up Bell extremely nicely, and was a huge part of a 43-18 victory against the 49ers in Week 2.

On top of that, Roethlisberger should have his rust knocked off fairly soon, and the passing game should be almost unstoppable. With Brown being one of the most dominant wide receivers in the league, and Martavis Bryant emerging week by week as a premier wideout, the passing game is very hard to stop when Ben is rolling.

On top of that, the defense has been shockingly amazing, and could really be the biggest reason Pittsburgh is still in contention this season. The young bunch was finally able to cool off the red rifle, making sure football fans still knew that it was Andy Dalton in that striped uniform.

The defense has been masters of the blitz, and has been consistently applied pressure to quarterbacks, which has allowed to secondary to make some plays, and create turnovers. Even Special Teams seems to be getting in on the action, blocking a Mike Nugent kick this week.

Next: Steelers fall in power rankings

It seems that without Bell, people are ready to write off Pittsburgh as any real contender, but that’s the wrong thing to do. Pittsburgh is a team that has lived by the idea of “Next Man Up” and head coach Mike Tomlin has been a huge believer of the phrase, and has applied it beautifully throughout his tenure.

With the toughest schedule in the league coming up, and big games with playoff implications coming week by week, the team will need to move on, and step up sooner rather than later.