Thumb-nailing the crinkled paper off the neck of his sweaty Coors Light, Kevin Brinkhoff stared from the corner of the bar at Rosa Villa across the room to where he met his wife in 1995.

"Jimmy's like a father to me," he said, nodding at the harried fixture of a barkeep with the stogie jammed in the corner of his mouth. "I think that day I told her that Jimmy was my father."

Yeah, those were heady times.

Brinkhoff was working on an engagement and the Steelers were headed for the Super Bowl. The mood inside the landmark North Side tavern two blocks from what's left of Three Rivers Stadium's parking lots was not as urgently hopeful yesterday. Traffic at the bar was just as thick and wet and smoky as ever in the artificial pregame light, with shots of Jacquins flanking the beers all around, but a sour resentment hung there like still another Steelers punt with the team down the street ready to complete its worst season since the final days of the Emperor Chas.

"This has been a tumultuous season," said Brinkhoff, who has been in the Rosa Villa before every Steelers home game for the past 15 years. "Losses, rumors, innuendo. I'm hopin' they don't win today and give people a false sense of security. I think it's a bad team from top to bottom. ...

"You listen to Cowher, every week he says the same thing, 'We don't want to panic.' Well, when is the time to panic? I think the panic button should have been pushed six weeks ago."

Outside, in the lots along General Robinson Street and the remainders that border the stadium, the volume of humanity necessary to give a Steelers game its full aromatic complement of kielbasa and urine was about only four-fifths present. Thus the Sunday cottage industries -- the clothing peddlers, the peanuts and popcorn and hoagie people, and the homeless -- were having an off day.

"I ain't eaten in two days," said a homeless woman on the fringe of the tailgating under the Fort Duquesne Bridge. "And I ain't doin' nothin' today. Look at my cup."

In the press box just after halftime, Steelers President Dan Rooney was looking at a 31-7 deficit and something like 12,000 empty seats but didn't sound anything close to bitter about it.

"Any [amount of no-shows] is disappointing," he said, "but it was better than last week, when we knew it would be bad because of Christmas."

Rooney said he thinks his team has been treated well by the fans but won't agree with those who say the talent isn't there.

"No, not at all," he said. "Our offensive line was decimated and if you don't have a line, there's not much you can do. I think at the beginning of the season we all thought we'd be better than last year. We looked for improvement and we didn't get it."

-- By Gene Collier

1938 The March of Dimes campaign to fight polio was organized.

2000 The last new daily "Peanuts" strip by Charles Schulz ran in 2,600 newspapers.

Today's birthdays Record producer Sir George Martin, 84. Musician Stephen Stills, 65. Actress Victoria Principal, 60. Actor-director Mel Gibson, 54.

Thought for today: "To have reason to get up in the morning, it is necessary to possess a guiding principle. A belief of some kind. A bumper sticker, if you will."

-- Judith Guest, American author.

First Published: January 3, 2010, 5:00 a.m.