Ben Roethlisberger completes 10 passes to Antonio Brown for 150 yards and two touchdowns. The Steelers roll the Jacksonville Jaguars, 38-10. After the game, Roethlisberger and Brown profess their love for each other and say the uneasiness between them this week was overblown.
Can you see it happening Sunday?
Easily.
Roethlisberger was spot on the other day when he said he and Brown have a chance to go down as one of the great quarterback-wide receiver combos in NFL history. That's why it's so easy to imagine the two having a spectacular Sunday or any day. Roethlisberger is the best quarterback in Steelers history. Yes, better than Terry Bradshaw. Brown is the best wide receiver in Steelers history. Yes, better than Lynn Swann and John Stallworth.
But I'm not buying that everything is just fine with Roethlisberger and especially Brown.
Brown threw a tirade last Sunday in Baltimore because Roethlisberger missed him when he was wide-open early in the second quarter. He showed up Roethlisberger on the field by holding his arms up in disbelief, then went to the sideline and did a Sean Rodriguez on a Gatorade jug before angrily pulling away from offensive coordinator Todd Haley. I'm thinking it affected Brown's performance the rest of the game. He was shut out the rest of the way until Roethlisberger threw him an 8-yard pass to the Ravens' 1 on the Steelers' next-to-last play.
What happens the next time Brown isn't happy with his statistics? Does he throw another fit? Does he pout again? Does he lose focus, as he did in the playoff loss to New England last season? Does it maybe cost the Steelers a game?
You know it will happen.
No less than former Steelers teammate Ryan Clark insinuated that Brown is a fraud who cares more about his numbers than the team winning. I couldn't agree more. Brown's behavior makes you think he'd rather have 10 catches in a loss than five catches in a win.
"Antonio has done an extremely good job of tricking people," Clark told ESPN radio last week. "He's done a very good spin job of having us think, or making people think who don't know him, that it's all about the Pittsburgh Steelers, he's just a hard worker who's here to win football games. No, Antonio Brown loves Antonio Brown."
It hurts the team.
"(Brown's) superhuman on the football field and, when (his antics) happen, it almost brings him back to being a mere mortal, if you will," Roethlisberger said on his weekly Tuesday radio show on 93.7 The Fan. "It gets in his head and it just messes with all of us a little bit. I just think that this is causing a distraction that none of us really need."
Brown puts Roethlisberger in a tough spot each week. Roethlisberger is aware he is surrounded by a variety of stars, including Le'Veon Bell and Martavis Bryant. He wants to keep everyone happy but admits, "Sometimes, there's not enough footballs to go around."
Bell and Bryant get that.
Brown doesn't.
It's not good for the team in more ways than one when Brown reacts the way he does when the ball doesn't come his way. Roethlisberger said after the loss in Chicago on Sept. 24 that he felt he was focusing too much on Brown because of his comfort level and "amazing chemistry" with him, sure, but also because he doesn't want his top receiver to go in the tank. It's probably no coincidence that Roethlisberger threw a deep pass for Brown into double coverage last Sunday on the first play after his tantrum _ it was incomplete _ and went to him on that late play trying to get him a touchdown.
But maybe that's about to change.
Hopefully, for the good of the Steelers, it will change.
"I can't let it affect my play-calling or forcing balls," Roethlisberger said. "In the past, I've done that where I've tried to keep guys happy and it creates a bad issue, whether it's a turnover or a bad play because someone else was open and I'm trying to force it. So, at the end of the day, if it's going to hurt the team I just kind of say, 'You're going to have to just deal with it.' Winning is more important. They can be mad at me all they want, but they better realize that if we won the game, that's all that matters."
Roethlisberger won't hold a grudge against Brown. He cares too much about winning to do that. He and Hines Ward had a bad relationship after Ward called him out for missing a game in Baltimore in 2009 because of a concussion, but neither let it affect their production on the field. Roethlisberger will get past this.
For his part, Brown apologized for "all the noise and the distractions." But, sorry, I can't take him seriously. It's a joke around Steelers headquarters that he leads the league in Monday apologies. It doesn't seem to change his behavior.
Roethlisberger said he hated to call out Brown but felt the need to do it because he considers it a part of his job as team captain to correct something he sees as detrimental to the squad. That's true, but it's more Mike Tomlin's responsibility to demand accountability. Tomlin has been horribly lax in that regard with Brown, consistently justifying Brown's immaturity by pointing out how he's the Steelers' hardest worker and one of their most productive players.
"It's funny to me sometimes that people think I can stop a grown man from doing something like that," Tomlin said in 2015 of Brown's excessive celebration penalties. "What do you want me to do? Not play him?"
Surprisingly, Tomlin did chide Brown for last Sunday's outburst. "Be professional." But did Tomlin really have a choice? After Brown disrespected one of his coaches?
It's not as if Tomlin is the only man in the Steelers organization to enable Brown. That starts at the top. Art Rooney II did it after last season when he described the well-documented problems Brown creates as "little annoyances, with the emphasis on little." He then signed Brown to a five-year, $72.7 million contract, the richest for a wide receiver in NFL history.
The justification with Brown is always the same. He works hard. He's a competitor. He's a big reason the team wins. Maybe the biggest reason.
It's all true. So is the argument that Brown's good outweighs his bad. But why does there have to be bad? How much better would Brown and the Steelers be without it?
That seemed to be the question Roethlisberger was asking this week.
It's a legitimate question.
