NASHVILLE, Tenn. -- The questions bounced around the Steelers' locker room all week like some nuclear reactor firing up, often in the language of accountants.
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Plaxico Burress believes the Steelers' high-risk, high-gain offense is validated by their berth in the AFC semifinals. (John Heller, Post-Gazette) |
Would the spread work from the start? How will the dime be affected? Should you use the nickel instead? How does the efficiency ratio of Tommy Maddox compare to Steve McNair? Do you put a spy on McNair? How much will special teams play a part? Will the Titans open in a Cover 2 or put eight men in the box? Run vs. pass, dime vs. 3-4, X vs. O?
Wayne Gandy, the Steelers' bright, expressive left tackle with the voice of Mean Joe Greene, cut through the football twaddle to render an opinion.
"Anything over one turnover," Gandy said, "we could be dead."
That's as simple and direct as a head slap, and probably as true. For all the offensive and defensive statistics the Steelers and their opponents compiled this season, nothing determined victory or loss as did turnovers. When the Steelers commit more than their foes, they lose; vice-versa, they win.
"If you look up and see no turnovers by us, I think you'll see a happy Steelers sideline," Gandy said. "That's just our Achilles' heel. When I sit back and think about the five losses, I know for sure that in four of them we had three or more turnovers. That's what really puts us in bad situations."
Gandy is correct. Every time but one in which the Steelers lost the ball more than their opponent, they lost or tied the game. The ratio was 5-1 against New England, 5-2 against Oakland, 1-0 New Orleans, 3-2 Atlanta, 3-1 Tennessee and 5-1 Houston. It was 1-0 in Jacksonville but they won. Every other game, they committed fewer or the same number of turnovers as their opponent and won in the regular season.
The biggest exception came last week against Cleveland in the playoffs when they turned the ball over three times to just one for the Browns and won, although they needed the sixth-biggest comeback in NFL playoff history to do so.
The Steelers led the AFC in turnovers this season and that, Gandy noted, has come because of a change in philosophy. Gone are the days when they tried to protect the ball, grind it out with Kordell Stewart at quarterback and Jerome Bettis, and win the game.
Now, they have a gunslinger's philosophy with Tommy Maddox at quarterback and, while they still were mostly successful, they paid the price at times.
"The game plan since I've been here has been not to turn the ball over, run the ball, play good defense," Gandy said.
"This year, we switched so fast in approaches. It used to be let's win 17-14. Now it's Katie bar the door, we can score 50 points. When you do that, especially with a quarterback like Tommy who has a lot of confidence in what he can do, there are times you have to take the turnovers with it."
Perhaps the philosophy was forced to change because there are two things they are not quite as good at anymore -- running the ball and playing good defense. They have slipped in both areas, not drastically, but slipped nonetheless. That is why they were forced to throw Sunday to beat Cleveland and why they might have to do so against Tennessee at 4:30 p.m. today, when the Steelers and Titans meet in an AFC divisional playoff game.
The Steelers took all kinds of different approaches this season, odd since this was the team christened preseason favorites in the AFC because they returned 20 starters from their 13-3 team last year. But somewhere along the way, they abandoned the Stewart-Bettis offense and turned it over to Touchdown Tommy Gun and his gaggle of receivers, and the defense has caved in far too many times.
Now, they are trying to get to the Super Bowl on the road, since they have had so little success doing it at home. The past two times they've been in the playoffs, they had a bye the first weekend, played the AFC championship game at home and lost.
"If you're not comfortable on the road you better get comfortable by Saturday morning," safety Lee Flowers said.
They seem to prefer it this way -- on the road as underdogs. Even many of their own fans abandoned them in the fourth quarter Sunday before their memorable comeback to beat Cleveland.
"It's like us against the world and that's how we like it," receiver Hines Ward said. "Playing on the road, nobody gives us a chance to go down there to Tennessee and beat Tennessee. It's a case like Tampa. Nobody in the world gave us a chance to win that ballgame. We stood there together as 53 men going out there, coaches and players, and we were the only ones who believed we could win the ballgame. We like it that way."
Said receiver Plaxico Burress: "I love it. It's a challenge. There's nothing better than going into someone's house and beating them. To hear their fans going crazy for the first or second quarter, and at the end of the game seeing them turn their backs and leaving the stadium. There's no better feeling for an opposing team."
The Steelers did that five times this season, including their most recent 17-7 victory at Tampa Bay that clinched the AFC North Division title Dec. 23. One place they did not do it was at The Coliseum Nov. 17. They lost 31-23 to the Titans in a game that was 31-7 until they closed the gap with touchdowns on their final two drives.
They lost three turnovers in that game to just one for Tennessee.
"We don't think anybody can stop us as long as we don't stop ourselves," Burress said. "If we don't turn the ball over and beat ourselves, we're a pretty good team."
Burress figures their high-risk, high-performance approach has been worth it. They are here, aren't they? One of four left. If they win, they advance to the AFC championship game, which would then either take them to Oakland or put them back in Heinz Field against the Jets Jan. 19.
But that's another game for another day. The only one that matters to them is this one against Tennessee, and the one statistic that likely will determine the outcome is turnover ratio.
"When we turn the ball over," Ward said, "we're just an average team."
Ed Bouchette can be reached at ebouchette@post-gazette.com or 412-263-3878.
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