Ben is pure Steeler
PITTSBURGH — Ben Roethlisberger goes to his second Super Bowl surrounded by a strange entourage. It’s not just friends and family he likes to keep close to his jersey. It’s defensive tackles, linebackers, safeties, too.
"This is my advice for the Arizona Cardinals," said Baltimore’s Trevor Pryce, after a fruitless night of almost getting Roethlisberger within his grasp. "Don’t rush anybody."
What?
"If you chase him, he just gets to play sandlot football. That’s what he likes. He wants you to rush him so he can run around and make plays. Their whole team wants to rush him, because their offensive linemen, uh, really aren’t that hard to beat. And that’s when they get you in trouble.
"Just back off and keep him in the pocket and make him play regular football. Not recess. You’ll have a better chance."
The Ravens hit Roethlisberger seven times in this AFC Championship Game and sacked him four times. He isn’t a real hard target. He’s 6-foot-5 and weighs 241, and he gets banged around so much that he could wear the Ravens’ bruise-colored jersey with no problem.
Instead, he’s pure Steeler. There might be better quarterbacks, but there is no one so perfectly yoked to the town in which he plays.
Please note that there might not be better quarterbacks, either.
Roethlisberger is like an overgrown Fran Tarkenton with a much better fastball. He dances in and out of the traffic, always waiting for receivers to do something, and he often sees the plays before they do.
It was difficult to know just how he sensed Santonio Holmes was going to pop open, there in the second quarter, when the malicious Ravens were bearing down, but he did, and Holmes spurted 60 yards with the touchdown that put the Steelers up, 13-0.
They won, 23-14, and Roethlisberger will take on the Cardinals in Tampa on Feb. 1.
The Arizona coach, Ken Whisenhunt, coordinated Pittsburgh’s offense in the Super Bowl year of 2005 and presumably knows Dancing Ben better than most.
Maybe he’ll listen to Pryce.
"I guess I could be successful if they made me stay in the pocket," Roethlisberger said, "but why put the reins on? I like playing backyard football."
And when the backyard is frozen he’s even better. Roethlisberger is 7-2 in the postseason and has 14 touchdown passes and 11 interceptions in those games.
Tom Brady has more rings, Peyton Manning has more numbers, and Eli Manning and Philip Rivers were both drafted higher than Roethlisberger in 2004. Kurt Warner is more clinical and polished.
But none can deal with pressure better than Roethlisberger, although he is the one quarterback who never has to deal with the Steelers defense.
"We’re the worldwide security force," said safety Ryan Clark, after Pittsburgh had three takeaways (to Baltimore’s none) and drove Joe Flacco’s quarterback rating down to 18.2 in this game.
Baltimore’s long gain of the night was 22 yards.
"Because everyone has talked about how great Flacco is, I think I’ll just say that we were fortunate to beat him and the Lord blessed us," Clark said acidly. "Was I getting tired of hearing it? Yeah, a little bit.
"We didn’t play against their offense. We played against their defense. Whoever was better was going to win."
Safety Troy Polamalu was tipping away passes and hunting down ballcarriers all night. He held tight end Todd Heap to three short catches. And then he honed in on Flacco’s pressurized pass, intercepted it and ran 40 yards for the game-icing touchdown.
"It was man-to-man with Heap and he was in the backfield, protecting," Polamalu said. "It allowed me to free up and just read Flacco’s eyes. A rookie (like Flacco) can never replace experience. Ben has won a lot of close games for us over the years."
Pryce had seen enough, after three Pittsburgh victories over Baltimore.
"We thought we saw the light at the end of the tunnel but it was just a train," he said.
And sometimes trains wreck. This was a bitterly violent game from kickoff to horn, culminating in
Clark’s shoulder shot that snapped Willis McGahee’s head back. He was strapped down on a cart and hauled out of the stadium, although he could move his arms and legs.
"It had an effect on me, to see him (McGahee) lying there," Pryce said. "This is a game. It’s not fight club."
No. In the recesses of Roethlisberger’s mind, it’s recess, even when he takes a hard shot in the back from rookie Haruki Nakamura and gets checked out by the doctors between series.
"To get me out of the game, they’re going to have to put me on a cart," he said.
Not the best choice of words, perhaps, but it seemed innocent. Maybe Arizona will get Roethlisberger out of the Super Bowl by giving him a podium.