During Sunday night's loss to the Packers, the Steelers made a pretty significant oversight while attempting to stop a two-point conversion in the fourth quarter.
Pittsburgh entered the fourth quarter with a 19–14 lead, but Green Bay took the lead with a touchdown from running back Josh Jacobs just five seconds into the quarter. The Packers lined up for a two-point conversion after the score and Jordan Love connected with a wide-open Romeo Doubs to make things 22–19.
As it turns out, the Steelers only had 10 players on the field during their attempted defense of the two-point conversion, something coach Mike Tomlin was asked about on Tuesday. Rather than criticize the mistake, Tomlin shrugged it off and said that such a mistakes can happen on occasion.
"Echols was in for Slay. Echols thought that they were going for one. I think he came off the field because he is not on field goal block, and we weren't able to get the transitional component of that," Tomlin explained, effectively downplaying what was a critical error on the Steelers' part, via Steelers Depot.
"That happens from time to time when you're rolling a lot of people. You never like it. But the reality is the more people you play, the more complex rotations are, particularly when rotations get abnormal," Tomlin explained.
Although the coaching staff didn't notice their lack of a full defense on the field in time to get an 11th player out there, safety Chuck Clark could be seen attempting to signal to the sideline that they were down a man. Unfortunately, no reinforcements came, resulting in an easy two-point conversion for Green Bay.
It certainly seems like Tomlin's letting himself and the rest of the coaching staff off easy for a mistake that proved quite costly. Had they fielded the correct number of players, they may have prevented the conversion and kept it a one-point game. The Steelers ended up losing 35–25 after failing their own two-point conversion attempt following a late touchdown.
The Packers improved to 5-1-1 on the year, while Pittsburgh fell to 4–3.
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This article was originally published on www.si.com as Mike Tomlin Had a Weak Excuse for Steelers Only Having 10 Men on Field on Key Play.
