By Gerry Dulac
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
http://www.post-gazette.com/steelers/
Friday, August 15, 2008
Peter Diana/Post-Gazette Buffalo Bills tight end Robert Royal scores his second touchdown.
TORONTO -- They can open and close the roof at Rogers Centre, slap a little paint and a few logos on the turf and call it a National Football League game.
But detractors aren't easily fooled.
In a city where the Canadian maple leaf is proudly displayed and the only thing more plentiful than the traffic is the number of hockey fans, the Steelers' defense looked as though it were slipping and sliding on ice against the Buffalo Bills last night.
And it wasn't the backups and players who won't be around in September who were looking awkward and clumsy. It was the first-unit defense, the one that had trouble protecting leads last season.
OK, so it's still summer and the real games don't begin for a couple of more weeks. And, not to worry, Lawrence Timmons will play more than he did in the first quarter -- one play -- once Sept. 7 rolls around.
Nonetheless, in two preseason outings, the first-team defense has allowed a field goal and two touchdowns on four possessions, the latest act of forgiveness coming in the 24-21 loss to the Bills.
"We weren't at our peak," said nose tackle Casey Hampton, appearing in his first game since coming off the physically unable to perform list. "They ran the plays we knew were coming. They just were dropping the ball on us."
If it were hockey, they would have pulled the goalie.
After the Philadelphia Eagles marched right down the field and kicked a field goal in their only appearance last week, the first-team defense hardly stiffened against the Bills, who scored the third-fewest points (252) in the league last season.
Peter Diana/Post-GazetteJames Harrison sacks Bills quarterback Trent Edwards in the first half.
Buffalo scored on its first two possessions -- quarterback Trent Edwards threw touchdown passes of 7 and 13 yards to tight end Robert Royal -- before the Steelers finally forced a three-and-out, the only one of the preseason for the first-teamers.
Granted, the defense showed almost none of its sub packages against the Bills, using cornerback William Gay as a replacement for nose tackle Casey Hampton on just five occasions, and rarely blitzing. On the Bills' 10-play scoring drive that gave them a 7-0 lead, the base defense was on the field for nine plays -- a rarity in these days of ever-rotating personnel packages.
Still, there are too many holes in the defense, and it has been this way since the second half of last season, even though the defense ranked No. 1 overall in the NFL. And the lapses have been noticeable because too many came in the fourth quarter.
On five occasions in 2007, the defense failed to protect a lead in the final minutes after the offense rallied from deficits, some double-digit shortages. The only time it didn't result in defeat was when Cleveland's Phil Dawson missed a 52-yard field goal as time expired in Week 9.
The most severe collapse came in the playoff loss to the Jacksonville Jaguars, when the offense rallied from a 28-10 deficit with three touchdowns in the fourth quarter and the defense let the Jaguars go 44 yards in eight plays and kick the winning field goal with 37 seconds remaining.
Does anyone forget the sight of quarterback David Garrard scrambling 32 yards on fourth-and-2, a play on which safety Tyrone Carter badly missed an open-field tackle?
The tackling wasn't much better against the Bills.
On three consecutive plays on the Bills' second touchdown drive, Gay missed a tackle on wide receiver Roscoe Parrish, resulting in a first down; cornerback Ike Taylor missed a tackle on wide receiver Lee Evans, resulting in a 17-yard gain, and safety Ryan Clark missed a tackle on a swing pass to running back Fred Jackson, turning a loss into a 5-yard gain.
For good measure, there was even a long run by the quarterback on third-and-13 -- Edwards stepping up in the pocket from his own 7 and gaining 22 yards to keep a scoring drive alive.
The good news: Once he got on the field with the second-team defense, Timmons was a one-man terror, sacking J.P. Losman on third down in the second quarter and hammering third-string quarterback Matt Baker as he released the ball in the fourth.
First published on August 15, 2008 at 12:00 am
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