Oct 23, 2016 4 min read

PITTSBURGH – The Steelers fought the good fight Sunday against the New England Patriots, but in the end, injury issues made things too difficult against a team of that caliber.

In the NFL, they don’t grade on effort. They grade on wins and losses.

That’s why the Steelers came out of their 27-16 loss Sunday to the New England Patriots a little salty, despite the fact they played without quarterback Ben Roethlisberger and defensive end Cameron Heyward.

Those two are arguably the best players on their respective side of the football and not having them hurt. But the Steelers weren’t using that as an excuse for their loss.

Despite what fans felt about the team’s chances – most predicted a slaughter of epic proportions – the players were confident coming into this game.

“It stings because we were right there,” said Steelers wide receiver Antonio Brown. “We left a couple of plays out there, a couple of opportunities where we could have had things go our way.”

So there will be no moral victories. No mantra of, “Wait until we’re healthy.”

The Steelers won’t look at this as a loss to grow from. They’re not in that business.

“We don’t play to build confidence,” said linebacker Arthur Moats. “In fact, we were all frustrated how much better we could have been. When you play 60 or 70 snaps per game good, and then a handful that you don’t, that’s the frustrating part. That’s on us. We have to be more consistent.”

Finding that consistency has been difficult in the first part of this season, largely because, not only the injuries they’ve had, but who has had them.

Backup quarterback Landry Jones played as well as could be expected in a situation such as this. In fact, he likely outperformed many of the outside expectations put on him.

Many fans expected him to be the main reason why the Steelers would lose this game.

While Jones did throw an interception in the end zone in the first quarter following a New England turnover, he had the Steelers within striking distance throughout most of this game.

Even Jones wasn’t taking solace in that.

“We moved the ball up and down the field, that was no issue,” said Jones, who threw for 281 yards with one touchdown and one interception. “The issue was the red zone. We kicked field goals instead of scoring touchdowns. Then we had that interception on the second drive of the game and missed a couple of field goals and then had a holding penalty on a touchdown pass. So, everyone had a hand in it.”

They did, indeed. Against many teams, those kind of things can be overcome.

Against the Patriots, they can get you beaten.

On Sunday, they did.

It’s not like we haven’t seen this before. The Patriots have beaten the Steelers in nine of the 11 games in which Tom Brady has been New England’s starting quarterback.

He’s not a future first-ballot Hall of Fame player for nothing. And many of those losses were much more lopsided than what happened yesterday.

That the Steelers were in the game with the mighty Patriots well into the fourth quarter could be considered something of a victory.

The Steelers, however, won’t take any solace in that.

And, if they play these Patriots again – which very well could happen in the postseason – perhaps they will be better for it having suffered through this stinging loss.

“I have confidence there’s a chance we may see those guys again,” said Steelers defensive end Stephon Tuitt. “The fact they came out here and kicked our butts at home, that’s what stinks.”

Dale Lolley can be reached at dlolley@observer-reporter.com.