The Ravens’ Joe Flacco is thrown hard to the grass by Arthur Moats for a second-quarter sack. — GETTY
DEJAN KOVACEVIC, DK ON PITTSBURGH SPORTS
Not on this night.
Not in this town.
Certainly not against this particular opponent.
“This was about the greatest of all the Steelers, about Mr. Steeler,” Willie Gay was telling me as the clock approached midnight Sunday but Heinz Field’s home locker room was still lit up like a thousand suns.
“And you know what else?” Gay kept on. “It was about Steelers football.”
Sure was, Will. One that Pittsburghers will be able to cherish on so many levels for a long time.
That was the greatest of all the Steelers, Mean Joe Greene — never leave off the ‘Mean,’ no matter how gentle the actual giant — receiving the ultimate honor from a franchise that’s famously never retired numbers: His No. 75 was put to rest, once and for all. As it had to be, for no one ever again will carve the face of the NFL’s only six-time Super Bowl champion.
And yes, that was Steelers football out there.
It was as Steelers football as Steelers football gets, with all the punching, kicking, body-slamming, gouging, cheap-shotting, taunting … oh, did I mention the Ravens were in town?
“We understood what this was all about,” Cam Heyward said. “We knew it was Baltimore. We knew it was a big game in the standings. But we also knew there was something bigger going on.”
He paused.
“And if we didn’t know it then, we sure do now.”
____________________
The spirit of the Steelers started with Chuck Noll’s surprising drafting of Greene in 1969, a move that would become almost as powerful symbolically as it was on the field. Because that team would be built on defense, on toughness, and it would be anchored by a very large, very angry man who would terrify the opponent’s most important players.
As Greene recalled a couple hours before the ceremony, “My first year, we were 1-13. We didn’t start very well. Thanks to the leadership of the Rooneys and Coach Noll … well, you all know the history of that.”
We do, although it’s never retold often enough. Nor is it ever celebrated too much.
Pittsburgh has other teams, but the Steelers are who we are. They’re our global brand. They’re the first word, upon hearing a mention of the city, that comes from the mouth of your taxi driver in London or Paris or Beijing. They’re our internal identity, too, even if we’re sometimes weary of admitting it. The Steelers were there for us when our mills were closing, when our friends and family members were fleeing for employment elsewhere, when everyone wrote us off as dying or as the next Detroit.
Noll was the architect, but Greene was the structural steel.
Ike Taylor worded it beautifully: “Pittsburgh wouldn’t be Pittsburgh without Joe Greene. I’m not talking about just the Steelers. I’m talking about Pittsburgh.”
Here’s the entire halftime ceremony, elegantly handled by Dan Rooney, Art Rooney II and others from the 1970s Steelers showing support. Once you watch, it’s easy to understand why nearly all of the 63,971 stayed in their seats at intermission.
____________________
Greene addressed the Steelers’ players before the game, at the invitation of Mike Tomlin, and no one should assume that’s a common occurrence. Charlie Batch was telling me he couldn’t recall any such distinctions in his many years on the roster.
Tomlin got it.
“It was a big time atmosphere at Heinz Field tonight. We got a lot of energy from our fans,” the coach said. “Obviously, it was an opportunity to salute the great Joe Greene. I think the guys just rode that emotional wave and did what was necessary for us to secure a victory.”
The players got it, too. Watch Brett Keisel proudly don the No. 75 at his stall before taking questions, and then listen to what he had to say:
“Joe got to go out the right way,” to repeat the Beard for emphasis. “He picked the Ravens game to have this celebration. It was only right, you know?”
Greene did pick it, too. Circled the date on the calendar when the Rooneys left it up to him.
____________________
Leadership and disposition and even iconic Coke commercials only go so far. A player’s got to play, or he’s just a number on just another team.
So while it was fun that the Steelers’ front seven sacked Joe Flacco four times and otherwise flushed him out all night long, nothing stood out quite like another old, retired guy … well, not retired anymore.
“Dude, are you really 36?” Heyward said to James Harrison at the next stall, as Harrison buttoned up his shirt following another two-sack performance. “Actually, I don’t care how old you are. I’m just glad you came back.”
No one saw this coming. Let’s be clear on that. Not Harrison. Not Tomlin, who sat next to Harrison at his retirement press conference just two months ago. Not anyone who saw him barely survive his season with the Bengals.
But this game changed in part because Harrison evidently can still perform at a high level, if not his peak, but also because Harrison, like Keisel got it. He got the Greene thing. And he’s always gotten the Baltimore thing.
The final score will obscure this, but the Steelers were getting manhandled by the Ravens early, especially while on offense. That’s the tone that was being set. It was looking like one of those mega-annoying nights where John Harbaugh could look all smug and Terrell Suggs could crow and Flacco could … ugh, whatever effect that is that Flacco has. It would be a lot like Week 2 down in Maryland, when the Ravens basically stole the Steelers’ lunch money, 26-6.
Harrison flipped that tone almost singlehandedly.
“He is who he is. He’s not a regular guy. He is James Harrison,” Tomlin replied to my question on that topic. “He’s getting up to speed and getting into shape and doing James Harrison-like things, which quite frankly is what we expect.”
Yeah, baloney. Such expectations aren’t accompanied by retirement gifts.
I asked Harrison if he knew he had this much left:
Typically baloney-free.
“That guy,” Jason Worilds would say, “there’s nothing about him that isn’t real.”
____________________
Even so, an argument could be made that the game truly was won where it almost was lost. Because the offensive line transformed itself from frightened — unless you can come up with a better adjective for conceding sacks on three consecutive plays to a defense that wasn’t even bothering to blitz — to formidable with one seeming snap of Mike Munchak’s fingers. Several linemen told me that their positional coach positively reamed them out early in the second quarter.
Here are two of those guys, neither of whom looked awake in the early going:
Other elements were put into place, such as keeping Le’Veon Bell and Heath Miller in to block and adding Matt Spaeth to the mix, but Tomlin was adamant when telling me, “We just got our traction.”
Noteworthy, too, from that same response: “Those guys have grown up in this series. They have taken their lumps some. They were once young guys playing in this series. But now the group is three, four or five years in the league. They have played together. They have grown up in this series. Their play needs to reflect it, and I think it did as the game wore on.”
Key phrase there was “in this series.” Won’t hear that applied to Bengals or Browns.
____________________
One sure sign a team isn’t going to be intimidated is when it starts sticking up for itself.
I would say that Suggs embarrassed the Ravens with his showing all night long, but I’m pretty sure they’re maxed out in that category, on and off the field. Even so, it took a special level of Raven-ness for this attack from behind on the knees of an already-stalled LeGarrette Blount:
Unbelievable, right?
The Steelers, to a man, didn’t back down. Bell charged right over and looked like he was ready to fight. Kelvin Beachum joined in. Multiple scraps would ensue over the course of the game. And specifically regarding Suggs, they stayed in his face, yapped back at his every yap — even Tomlin and the injured Taylor participated — and kept him more focused on … well, looking stupid than playing smart.
“I don’t know what he was thinking,” Blount said. “He’s known to be a dirty player. As long as he does that, he’ll keep having people come after him and do whatever we did to get in his head.”
Suggs’ remorseless explanation: “That was the only way I could get him down without him gaining more yards. I wasn’t trying to get him hurt. I was just trying to get the big guy down. Whatever.”
Best reaction came from Gilbert, who said, “I expect he’ll be getting a nice notice in the mail Monday morning about that hit from the league. And if he doesn’t, I’ll be pretty ticked off. No place for that.”
Gilbert then added, “If you turn that tape recorder off, I’ll tell you what I’d really like to tell him.”
Off it went. Too bad for you. It was great.
____________________
Ben Roethlisberger is the NFL’s best quarterback right now. He’s got 12 touchdowns in the past two games, six in each, and his team has produced 94 points.
Antonio Brown is the NFL’s best wide receiver right now. He made 11 catches for 144 yards, including a 54-yard touchdown in which he left no fewer than four Ravens in his wake.
What, you’re waiting for an opinion on any of that?
These guys are beyond opinion at this point.
____________________
Troy Polamalu was knocked out of the game by a sprained left knee after an awkward collision, though he doesn’t think it’s serious. He also was one of several Steelers with visible cuts and scratches and bruises, something that used to be seen all the time after Baltimore games but was now back in a big way. Heck, if there’s one resonating visual from the evening, it’ll be all those contorting expressions Roethlisberger was making after that cheap helmet shot from Courtney Upshaw, which merits its own hefty fine.
But this, as Polamalu explained in a quiet moment as the room was finally losing a little of that glow, was the natural order of things.
“My uncle was a pretty tough guy,” Polamalu began with a wholly unsolicited tale after I mentioned his slight limp. “We were playing baseball once when I was a kid, and I got picked off first base. He was out in center field, and he made this face at me. I’ll never forget it. Because later, when I was going for a popup, I crashed into a fence and cut up the right side of my cheek.”
Motioned across that area as he spoke.
“And my uncle said, ‘Good, because you’ll learn from it. You’ll always learn from your mistakes, and you’ll always learn what it takes to compete.’ That’s exactly what I was thinking about when I was coming off the field tonight after that play. If I make that tackle square, nothing else happens.”
So that’s the mistake part. What about the competing part?
“They’re Baltimore. And to beat them, we’ve got to play Steelers football.”
Amazing back-to-back wins. Never thought they'd win three straight after the Browns debacle. Maybe this Tomlin guy can coach a little bit after all. And maybe the OC isn't an imbecile. Ben: Not much you can add to the record-setting two-game stretch. The guy's a warrior.
Still don't know what to make of Tomlin, but all Haley really needed was Munchak pixie dust. Lest we forget, got glimpse of what it's like without that again when Ben was under early duress, up through those 3 consecutive sacks and a blow to Ben's jaw. Then we got the dust back.
I think wheaton coming on and bryant being suprisingly huge in his first 3 games lets him do more than multiple bubble screens, a few weeks ago i was the steward of the fire haley union. He has firmly made me shut my mouth. Munchaks been huge HUUUGE also.
If season over now, Ben has to be League MVP. Though they'd never give it to an asst., COY has to be Munchak. Separately, since no one else noticed, I'll point out that Wing saved day on conversion (after bobbling placehold) with great improv, and throwing with... RIGHT hand.
Brady has to be right there too. I'm a die hard Steelers fan, but you can't ignore what he is doing in New England. CO-MVPs for me at this point in the season
I really don't think they'll ever give a league MVP to Ben. Heck, he didn't even get the MVP in the Super Bowl win over AZ. Any other QB gets that MVP.
He's in the discussion with Brady, for sure. He out-dueled Luck, a candidate, and Rivers has cooled considerably. Defense hardly ever wins, making JJ unlikely.
I think Arians is again the COY. 1 loss and he's started 3 QBs, two of whom are barely worthy of a roster spot.
I'm all choked up over this win and this column. One of the biggest reasons that I am such a fan of this team is that brotherhood that the Steelers share, the kind where past and present teammates honor the legacy of Mean Joe Greene and "Steelers Football" is played at an unbelievable level against the despised Ravens. A great win, and a great honor for a great Steeler.
Yep, Joe Greene is THE player who changed the franchise. As much as he imposed his will on opponents, more importantly, he imposed his will on the culture of his own, since-forever, sad-sack team.
Another great piece, DK. Last week was a great game for the Black N Gold, but this game could be remembered as the turning point of the season. Lots left to play out, but this game, on this day, was a must win division game against a hated rival. I think a statement was made. And RUSH videos? Bonus!
I think the 2+ minutes against the Texans will be looked at as the turning point if they continue playing like they are right now. Strong play has followed that little stretch.
Doesn't get much better than this, beating the Ravens at their own game at Heinz Field and wiping that shittty grin off Harbaugh's mug. A full house and on Mean Joe's night.
Bravo!
Joe Greene was the foundation of the 70s dynasty team. Ben is the new foundation of the modern day Steelers. He is our most intimidating weapon just like Mr. Greene was in the 70s.
Great article DK ... Aside from the thrill of winning such an epic rivalry game on national TV on "Mean Joe" night, I'm thrilled that some of our young players got to see some vintage James Harrison.
I just really want to know who had the brilliant idea of letting this offense go vertical, when they finally figured it out, and hell, what took so damn long.
Seeing the offense do this makes me wonder what they could have been earlier if they weren't going sideways all game.
I almost wonder if there's still that fear that they can't protect Roethlisberger on long dropbacks.
.
It certainly didn't look like they could until after Munchak got in their faces in the second quarter.
Glad the Steelers got their heads out of their butts after the 1st Q. Happy for Mean Joe, of course he picked the Ratbirds game, he gets it too. Suggs is trash and is becoming less and less relevant with each game played with them. Happy for Ben, he got a real record 12TD's!!
Oh and DK this column is perfect. We know you bring your best to the site everyday, but man, you are feeling it with this one brother. If people read this and don't want more of it they are nuts! Best coverage in town, hands down.
November 2, 2014
Column: This one’s for you, Mean Joe
by Dejan Kovacevic • Columns • Steelers
The Ravens’ Joe Flacco is thrown hard to the grass by Arthur Moats for a second-quarter sack. — GETTY
DEJAN KOVACEVIC, DK ON PITTSBURGH SPORTS
Not on this night.
Not in this town.
Certainly not against this particular opponent.
“This was about the greatest of all the Steelers, about Mr. Steeler,” Willie Gay was telling me as the clock approached midnight Sunday but Heinz Field’s home locker room was still lit up like a thousand suns.
“And you know what else?” Gay kept on. “It was about Steelers football.”
Sure was, Will. One that Pittsburghers will be able to cherish on so many levels for a long time.
That was the greatest of all the Steelers, Mean Joe Greene — never leave off the ‘Mean,’ no matter how gentle the actual giant — receiving the ultimate honor from a franchise that’s famously never retired numbers: His No. 75 was put to rest, once and for all. As it had to be, for no one ever again will carve the face of the NFL’s only six-time Super Bowl champion.
And yes, that was Steelers football out there.
It was as Steelers football as Steelers football gets, with all the punching, kicking, body-slamming, gouging, cheap-shotting, taunting … oh, did I mention the Ravens were in town?
There was that, too: Pittsburgh 43, Baltimore 23.
“We understood what this was all about,” Cam Heyward said. “We knew it was Baltimore. We knew it was a big game in the standings. But we also knew there was something bigger going on.”
He paused.
“And if we didn’t know it then, we sure do now.”
____________________
The spirit of the Steelers started with Chuck Noll’s surprising drafting of Greene in 1969, a move that would become almost as powerful symbolically as it was on the field. Because that team would be built on defense, on toughness, and it would be anchored by a very large, very angry man who would terrify the opponent’s most important players.
As Greene recalled a couple hours before the ceremony, “My first year, we were 1-13. We didn’t start very well. Thanks to the leadership of the Rooneys and Coach Noll … well, you all know the history of that.”
We do, although it’s never retold often enough. Nor is it ever celebrated too much.
Pittsburgh has other teams, but the Steelers are who we are. They’re our global brand. They’re the first word, upon hearing a mention of the city, that comes from the mouth of your taxi driver in London or Paris or Beijing. They’re our internal identity, too, even if we’re sometimes weary of admitting it. The Steelers were there for us when our mills were closing, when our friends and family members were fleeing for employment elsewhere, when everyone wrote us off as dying or as the next Detroit.
Noll was the architect, but Greene was the structural steel.
Ike Taylor worded it beautifully: “Pittsburgh wouldn’t be Pittsburgh without Joe Greene. I’m not talking about just the Steelers. I’m talking about Pittsburgh.”
Here’s the entire halftime ceremony, elegantly handled by Dan Rooney, Art Rooney II and others from the 1970s Steelers showing support. Once you watch, it’s easy to understand why nearly all of the 63,971 stayed in their seats at intermission.
____________________
Greene addressed the Steelers’ players before the game, at the invitation of Mike Tomlin, and no one should assume that’s a common occurrence. Charlie Batch was telling me he couldn’t recall any such distinctions in his many years on the roster.
Tomlin got it.
“It was a big time atmosphere at Heinz Field tonight. We got a lot of energy from our fans,” the coach said. “Obviously, it was an opportunity to salute the great Joe Greene. I think the guys just rode that emotional wave and did what was necessary for us to secure a victory.”
The players got it, too. Watch Brett Keisel proudly don the No. 75 at his stall before taking questions, and then listen to what he had to say:
“Joe got to go out the right way,” to repeat the Beard for emphasis. “He picked the Ravens game to have this celebration. It was only right, you know?”
Greene did pick it, too. Circled the date on the calendar when the Rooneys left it up to him.
____________________
Leadership and disposition and even iconic Coke commercials only go so far. A player’s got to play, or he’s just a number on just another team.
So while it was fun that the Steelers’ front seven sacked Joe Flacco four times and otherwise flushed him out all night long, nothing stood out quite like another old, retired guy … well, not retired anymore.
“Dude, are you really 36?” Heyward said to James Harrison at the next stall, as Harrison buttoned up his shirt following another two-sack performance. “Actually, I don’t care how old you are. I’m just glad you came back.”
No one saw this coming. Let’s be clear on that. Not Harrison. Not Tomlin, who sat next to Harrison at his retirement press conference just two months ago. Not anyone who saw him barely survive his season with the Bengals.
But this game changed in part because Harrison evidently can still perform at a high level, if not his peak, but also because Harrison, like Keisel got it. He got the Greene thing. And he’s always gotten the Baltimore thing.
The final score will obscure this, but the Steelers were getting manhandled by the Ravens early, especially while on offense. That’s the tone that was being set. It was looking like one of those mega-annoying nights where John Harbaugh could look all smug and Terrell Suggs could crow and Flacco could … ugh, whatever effect that is that Flacco has. It would be a lot like Week 2 down in Maryland, when the Ravens basically stole the Steelers’ lunch money, 26-6.
Harrison flipped that tone almost singlehandedly.
“He is who he is. He’s not a regular guy. He is James Harrison,” Tomlin replied to my question on that topic. “He’s getting up to speed and getting into shape and doing James Harrison-like things, which quite frankly is what we expect.”
Yeah, baloney. Such expectations aren’t accompanied by retirement gifts.
I asked Harrison if he knew he had this much left:
Typically baloney-free.
“That guy,” Jason Worilds would say, “there’s nothing about him that isn’t real.”
____________________
Even so, an argument could be made that the game truly was won where it almost was lost. Because the offensive line transformed itself from frightened — unless you can come up with a better adjective for conceding sacks on three consecutive plays to a defense that wasn’t even bothering to blitz — to formidable with one seeming snap of Mike Munchak’s fingers. Several linemen told me that their positional coach positively reamed them out early in the second quarter.
Here are two of those guys, neither of whom looked awake in the early going:
Other elements were put into place, such as keeping Le’Veon Bell and Heath Miller in to block and adding Matt Spaeth to the mix, but Tomlin was adamant when telling me, “We just got our traction.”
Noteworthy, too, from that same response: “Those guys have grown up in this series. They have taken their lumps some. They were once young guys playing in this series. But now the group is three, four or five years in the league. They have played together. They have grown up in this series. Their play needs to reflect it, and I think it did as the game wore on.”
Key phrase there was “in this series.” Won’t hear that applied to Bengals or Browns.
____________________
One sure sign a team isn’t going to be intimidated is when it starts sticking up for itself.
I would say that Suggs embarrassed the Ravens with his showing all night long, but I’m pretty sure they’re maxed out in that category, on and off the field. Even so, it took a special level of Raven-ness for this attack from behind on the knees of an already-stalled LeGarrette Blount:
Unbelievable, right?
The Steelers, to a man, didn’t back down. Bell charged right over and looked like he was ready to fight. Kelvin Beachum joined in. Multiple scraps would ensue over the course of the game. And specifically regarding Suggs, they stayed in his face, yapped back at his every yap — even Tomlin and the injured Taylor participated — and kept him more focused on … well, looking stupid than playing smart.
“I don’t know what he was thinking,” Blount said. “He’s known to be a dirty player. As long as he does that, he’ll keep having people come after him and do whatever we did to get in his head.”
Suggs’ remorseless explanation: “That was the only way I could get him down without him gaining more yards. I wasn’t trying to get him hurt. I was just trying to get the big guy down. Whatever.”
Best reaction came from Gilbert, who said, “I expect he’ll be getting a nice notice in the mail Monday morning about that hit from the league. And if he doesn’t, I’ll be pretty ticked off. No place for that.”
Gilbert then added, “If you turn that tape recorder off, I’ll tell you what I’d really like to tell him.”
Off it went. Too bad for you. It was great.
____________________
Ben Roethlisberger is the NFL’s best quarterback right now. He’s got 12 touchdowns in the past two games, six in each, and his team has produced 94 points.
Antonio Brown is the NFL’s best wide receiver right now. He made 11 catches for 144 yards, including a 54-yard touchdown in which he left no fewer than four Ravens in his wake.
What, you’re waiting for an opinion on any of that?
These guys are beyond opinion at this point.
____________________
Troy Polamalu was knocked out of the game by a sprained left knee after an awkward collision, though he doesn’t think it’s serious. He also was one of several Steelers with visible cuts and scratches and bruises, something that used to be seen all the time after Baltimore games but was now back in a big way. Heck, if there’s one resonating visual from the evening, it’ll be all those contorting expressions Roethlisberger was making after that cheap helmet shot from Courtney Upshaw, which merits its own hefty fine.
But this, as Polamalu explained in a quiet moment as the room was finally losing a little of that glow, was the natural order of things.
“My uncle was a pretty tough guy,” Polamalu began with a wholly unsolicited tale after I mentioned his slight limp. “We were playing baseball once when I was a kid, and I got picked off first base. He was out in center field, and he made this face at me. I’ll never forget it. Because later, when I was going for a popup, I crashed into a fence and cut up the right side of my cheek.”
Motioned across that area as he spoke.
“And my uncle said, ‘Good, because you’ll learn from it. You’ll always learn from your mistakes, and you’ll always learn what it takes to compete.’ That’s exactly what I was thinking about when I was coming off the field tonight after that play. If I make that tackle square, nothing else happens.”
So that’s the mistake part. What about the competing part?
“They’re Baltimore. And to beat them, we’ve got to play Steelers football.”