Week 2: Steelers 24, Seahawks 0

And the Oscar goes to ...

By Mike Batista

Vivien Leigh had Scarlett O'Hara. Ben Kingsley had Ghandi. Adam West had Batman.

Now we have seen Ben Roethlisberger in his defining role as an actor.

Already critically acclaimed for his ability to make injuries seem more serious than they really are, Roethlisberger's epic performance hit the big screen during Sunday's 24-0 win over the Seahawks at Heinz Field.

The Steelers led 14-0 with just over two minutes left in the first half when Heath Miller caught his only ball of the day. The 16-yard completion put the ball on the Seahawks' 4-yard line.

The customary, "Heeeeaaath!" baritone chant thundered through Irish Exit, a Steelers bar in Manhattan. But it was quickly muted when it became apparent that Roethlisberger was on the ground writhing in pain.

Seattle's Raheem Brock plowed into Roethlisberger's knees after the play, and it looked like Roethlisberger had met his Bernard Pollard, the guy who wiped out Tom Brady's 2008 season.

Think NBC envisioned Charlie Batch vs. Kerry Collins when it scheduled next week's Sunday night game? It looked like that, as well as 75 percent off all Steelers merchandise, would be the case as Roethlisberger was on the ground surrounded by Steelers staff.

Such is the fragile nature of life in the NFL.

Then, slowly, Roethlisberger rose.

And he walked off the field. No stretcher needed.

Roethlisberger missed just two plays. Perhaps during that brief time on the sideline, the master thespian should have donned a velvet robe and taken a bow.

That wasn't funny, Ben.

Roethlisberger said after the game that he never felt anything pop. So when you know it's not season-ending, why scare everyone like that when all you have is an ouch-ie?

I guess this means everything is normal again in Pittsburgh. Big Ben is a baby and the Steelers are winning.

Taking his punishment like a man didn't seem to work for Roethlisberger last week when the Ravens (by the way, did anyone tell those guys they had 15 more games on their schedule?) sacked him four times. Strangely enough, Pollard, who now plays for the Ravens, was one of the few white shirts Roethlisberger managed to avoid last week.

Why is it that every time the Steelers defense pitches a shutout, it's overshadowed by a Roethlisberger scare? The last time the Steelers blanked an opponent was the 2008 regular-season finale, when they beat the Browns 31-0. Roethlisberger sustained a concussion in that game, but it looked a lot worse. He was immobilized and carted off the field. Guess he wasn't acting then.

This is the first time the Seahawks were shut out since the last time they came to Pittsburgh in 2007. The Steelers defense cooked up this bagel by allowing just 164 yards of offense (31 on the ground), sacking sad sack Tarvaris Jackson five times and getting off the field 10 of the 12 times the Seahawks faced third down.

It was enough to make Seahawks coach Pete Carroll wish he were back at USC banging 19-year-old coeds. I'm not saying Carroll actually banged 19-year-old coeds at USC. I'm just saying that's what I would do if I were the football coach at the University of Southern California, that's all.

The Steelers defense still hasn't forced a turnover this season. We were denied the first high-flying hair show of the autumn when Troy Polamalu dropped what would have been an easy pick-six late in the game.

The Steelers didn't need turnovers to beat the Seahawks as emphatically as they did. Facing such a woeful team, the Steelers needed a win every bit as emphatic as this one after last week's bitchslapping in Baltimore. Anything less, and the doubts planted last week would have grown.

You might say that bullying an NFL wimp like the Seahawks doesn't prove a thing. The Steelers still have to beat a good team to show that they're championship material. Well, according to the website Football Outsiders, routing bad teams might be more indicative of a team's championship mettle than beating good teams in close games.

Football Outsiders classifies as "stomps" wins of at least 14 points over a team that finishes the season below .500. The site classifies as "guts" wins of 1-8 points over a team that finishes the season with a winning record. According to the site, teams with more stomps than their opponents do better in conference championship games and Super Bowls than teams with more guts than their opponents

A stomp is just what the doctor ordered for the Steelers Sunday. And while it's not officially a stomp until the Seahawks lose their ninth game to guarantee a losing season, I think it's safe to go to Vegas and put money on that happening.

The Steelers have another likely stomp opportunity Sunday night in Indianapolis. The Colts fell to 0-2 Sunday after losing to the Browns at home and are toothless without Peyton Manning.

At least NBC gets one of the star quarterbacks it planned on when the schedule was made. It would be better for the blood pressure of Steelers fans everywhere if that star's performance continues to be more Canton-worthy than Hollywood-worthy.

At Irish Exit in Manhattan, Steelers fans in enemy territory celebrate their win over the Jets in the AFC title game.

The closers

AFC championship game: Steelers 24, Jets 19

By Mike Batista

What the fuck was Antwaan Randle El doing in there?

The number 82 was the first thing I noticed in the Steelers' huddle when they came out of the two-minute warning.

The Steelers were clinging for dear life to a five-point lead. They faced a third-and-6 from the Jets' 40. All they had to do was run the ball again. Even if they didn't get the first down, they could run the clock down to about 1:15, then punt and try to pin the Jets deep. Sure, Mark Sanchez had a hell of a second half, but the Jets would have needed a touchdown with just over a minute left and no timeouts.

Randle El has done very little this season in his prodigal son return to the Steelers. So his presence in the game made it obvious the Steelers had a lot of receivers in there.

The Steelers weren't going to throw the ball, were they?

Sure enough, I see the Steelers go five-wide with Ben Roethlisberger in the shotgun. Yup. They were going there.

The Steelers were pretty much getting their asses kicked in the second half. Their 24-0 lead was down to a puny 24-19.

Now, the Steelers were going to put the ball in the air and risk an incompletion, which would stop the clock and give the Jets almost two minutes to score a touchdown. Or worse, there could have been an interception. Roethlisberger already had thrown two in the game.

I drank a few IC Lights at Irish Exit in Manhattan before the game, but I was too nervous to drink anything during the game, especially the second half. My tongue and throat were dryer than Steelers beat writer Ed Bouchette's sense of humor.

I did not need this, Steelers. I did not need this.

So Roethlisberger gets flushed out of the pocket, looking for someone to throw to. He wasn't going to be able to scramble for a first down like he had a couple of times earlier in the game. Too many white jerseys between him and the big yellow first-down line.

Just before running out of bounds, Roethlisberger tossed the ball to Antonio Brown. After his high-wire, Tyree-like catch last week, the sixth-round pick cradled this one like a newborn for 14 yards. First down. Pittsburgh's going to the Super Bowl.

Jets coach Rex Ryan slammed down his headset as if he was told his favorite snack shack was out of chili dogs.

Unlike me, the Steelers weren't scared. Unlike me, they weren't wringing their hands wishing the seconds would tick off the clock faster.

That's not how you win championships.

You win championships by closing the deal sooner rather than later.

You win championships when your fourth receiver, who hasn't been called upon all night, gets the job done when he finally is needed. And let's not forget Brown's 27-yard kickoff return a minute earlier after a Jets' touchdown narrowed the Steelers' lead to 24-19. That put the ball on the Steelers' 41 and helped the Steelers, and me, breathe a little easier.

Something tells me Brown, who was inactive for seven games this season, will get a hat every Sunday from now on.

Nothing safe about a safety

It looked like the Steelers' defining moment as 2010 AFC champions came midway through the fourth quarter. Leading 24-10, the Steelers stopped the Jets on first-and-goal from the 2-yard line. On third down from the 1, LaMarr Woodley batted down a Sanchez pass. On fourth down, LaDainian Tomlinson took it up the middle and got stood up against a battery of black jerseys.

A goal-line stand. The most dramatic display of football toughness. Unfortunately, right after that the Steelers fell victim to one of football's most emasculating occurrences: a safety.

Roethlisberger fumbled the snap from Doug "The Big" Legursky, who replaced injured Maurkice Pouncey at center, and smartly seized the ball so the Jets would get two points and not six.

The Jets had a safety in their win over the Steelers at Heinz Field last month. The quirkiest of football scoring plays seems to be a running gag whenever these two teams meet. Sort of like Maverick buzzing the tower in "Top Gun." Really annoying.

The safety made the score 24-12. And no, it was no consolation to me that it set things up for my predicted score of 27-15. Fuck that. Now, if the Jets got the two touchdowns they needed, they wouldn't just tie. They would win.

They got the first of those touchdowns after taking the free kick at their 42. Sanchez, who outplayed Roethlisberger, moved the Jets 58 yards in 10 plays and threw a 4-yard TD pass to Jerricho Cotchery, making it 24-19 with 3:06 left.

Fortunately, the Jets didn't touch the ball again.

Cooking up a comeback

After falling behind 24-0, the Jets had all the necessary ingredients for concocting a comeback.

They got a field goal to get on the board before halftime.

They got a touchdown less than three minutes into the second half when Santonio Holmes caught a 45-yard pass from Sanchez.

They got a turnover on the Steelers' ensuing possession when Brodney Pool intercepted Roethlisberger.

Meanwhile, the Steelers got the yips.

Pool's interception came right after Roethlisberger fumbled and recovered a snap.

The Jets went three-and-out on that possession, but Randle El muffed the punt and watched it roll out of bounds.

And after letting Rashard Mendenhall run wild for 95 yards in the first half, the Jets held him to 26 yards in the second half. The Steelers' passing attack wasn't used that much in the game. Roethlisberger completed only 10 of 19 passes for 133 yards to go with the two picks.

On this frigid Pittsburgh night, you got the feeling if the Steelers really needed to throw the ball, their aerial game would have been like a beer that hasn't been out of the freezer long enough. Still some ice in there.

Yuck.

In the second half, the Jets looked like the team that beat the Patriots. But the simple reason they couldn't beat the Steelers is because the Steelers scored more points in the half that they dominated.

Run, Rashard, Run

Am I the only one who forgot what Rashard Mendenhall looks like?

When he stood on the podium during the Steelers' celebration Sunday night, it was the most face time he's had since he got a call on his cell phone from the Steelers on draft day nearly three years ago.

Mendenhall's kind of been a man of mystery in his career. The Steelers' ability to move the ball through the air has at times made him an afterthought.

Jerome Bettis was The Bus. Willie Parker had the speed of a race car. What about Mendenhall? It hasn't been easy to identify him that way.

Sure, Mendenhall's had monster rushing numbers against porous run defenses like the Chargers last season and the Bills this season.

Mendenhall was seventh in the NFL this season with 1,273 rushing yards, just 25 less than Adrian Peterson. But he averaged only 3.9 yards per carry, and just hadn't passed the eye test that defines a top-notch running back like Peterson.

But he did on Sunday.

The Jets' first mistake came when they won the coin toss and deferred to the second half. While it worked out well for them in the second half, it kept dangerous Brad Smith, and the Jets' offense, off the field for the first nine minutes of the game.

Mendenhall carried eight times for 28 yards on the Steelers' opening drive. He scored on a 1-yard touchdown run in which he stuck his arm across the goal line with Bart Scott trying to take him down.

The touchdown gave the Steelers a 7-0 lead. It also softened any emotional blow from the loss of Maurkice Pouncey on the previous play. Pouncey left the game with a high-ankle sprain. Even though he's barely old enough to drink, the rookie center has been so good this year that many of his older teammates look up to him.

But The Big Legursky filled in admirably, and the Steelers' first-half fireworks had just begun.

The centerpiece of Mendenhall's performance was his 35-yard run in the second quarter, putting the ball on the Jets' 27. Isaac Redman gave Mendenhall a breather and got the Steelers deeper into field goal range with runs of eight and 13 yards. Shaun Suisham's 20-yard field goal made it 10-0.

Mendenhall found a couple of other ways to help on the Steelers' next possession. With the Steelers at the Jets' 16 and all the receivers covered downfield, Mendenhall got open in the flat, caught a pass and rambled to the 2. That set up Roethlisberger's 2-yard touchdown run. Jets' linebacker Bryan Thomas was too worried about Mendenhall, and that opened a lane the size of the Tuscarora Tunnel for Roethlisberger, who scored to make it 17-0.

Then came the grand finale of the Steelers' first-half spectacle. How many times over the years have we seen one Steeler mug an opposing quarterback and another Steeler pick up the free ball and take it the other way?

It's quite a sight to behold.

It happened again Sunday when Ike Taylor strip sacked Sanchez, and William Gay cleaned up. Gay didn't just fall on the ball. Oh no. He hovered over it and positioned himself to grab it and take it to the house. With his dreadlocks, Gay has a little (and I do mean a little) of the flair that Troy Polamalu has on his takeaways.

Gay ran it back 19 yards for a touchdown to increase the Steelers' lead to 24-0 with 1:23 left in the first half, and Heinz Field was awash in an ear-splitting, Terrible Towel-waving celebration of Steelerism.

Little did anyone know that the reaction to Gay's touchdown would serve as the Steelers' sendoff party as they were deployed to a treacherous second half.

It was time to hunker down.

But they survived. Next stop: Dallas.

I guess Randle El can come, too.

The road goes through Pittsburgh

By Mike Batista

Don't put the cap on the Big Ketchup Bottle just yet.

There's going to be one more football game at Heinz Field.

The Steelers' fourth AFC championship game in seven years, their fifth in 10 years and their eighth in 17 years will be in Pittsburgh against the Jets, who stunned the Patriots 28-21 Sunday.

When I watched the game, I was thinking back to 1986, when as a Celtics fan I was rooting like crazy for the Rockets to beat the Lakers in the Western Conference final so the Celtics wouldn't have to face the Lakers in the NBA Finals.

I couldn't sleep the night the Rockets won the series because it suddenly hit me that the Celtics weren't going to get a chance to beat their biggest rivals to win another championship.

That's actually not the case in this situation, because I honestly didn't know who to root for when watching the Jets and Patriots.

On one hand, I would have liked to have seen the Steelers get another shot at Tom Brady, their biggest tormentor of the past decade. If they win another championship, a win over the Patriots in Foxborough would have been a nice jewel in the crown.

But the Patriots, who have lost their last three postseason games, including the last two at home, have gone from Team of the Decade to a franchise that can't get the job done in the playoffs.

To reach the eighth Super Bowl in franchise history, the Steelers were going to have to beat a team that has won at Heinz Field in the last nine weeks, no matter how Sunday's game unfolded.

The Steelers were without Troy Polamalu when they lost to the Jets 22-17 on Dec. 19. They had Polamalu, although he was mired in a mid-season funk, when they lost 39-26 to the Patriots on Nov. 14 in a game that wasn't as close as the score indicates.

So getting to the Super Bowl should be easier for the Steelers with the Patriots out of the way.

Theoretically, anyway.

At least it might make my decision about where to watch the game easier. It's either going to be Bob Hyland's Sports Page in White Plains, NY or Irish Exit, a Steelers bar in Manhattan.

Since it's going to be the Jets, I'm leaning toward the big city.

Sports Page will be filled with Jets fans. This is the place where Jets fans cheered when Brady tore up his knee in the 2008 season opener.

People are much nicer on the 4 train in the Bronx, although I might have to cloak my Steelers gear with my coat until I'm safely in the Steelers enclave.

It'll be a fun week behind enemy lines.

Got anything to say, Rex?