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Pittsburgh Steelers (1-1) at Cleveland Browns (1-1)
Okay, I really waited until the last minute for my preview of this particular game. It is not just 8pm as I write this, and the game is either already underway, or about to get underway.
So really quickly, let me write this preview in and hopefully get it published before the game starts and, failing that, before the game is decided in some significant way.
Let me admit to one thing: I would really prefer seeing the Browns win. They are the kind of team that I have come to root for over the years, a sentimental favorite, if not one of the favorites in the league. The Bills, likewise, are that for me in recent seasons in particular as well. In the past, the Red Sox, White Sox, and the Cubs were like that in baseball as well. The Toronto Maple Leafs and, increasingly, any team north of the border in the NHL would be that in hockey. Arguably, the Nets and Knicks and Pacers would be those teams in the NBA.
Really, it would be nice to see the Browns finally turn things around and start winning regularly. In particular, it would be nice to see them finally reach - and especially to win - a Super Bowl. And a few seasons ago, it felt to me like this team might finally be heading in that direction.
Not anymore, however. The loss last week felt like one of those types of haunting losses that the Browns have too many of, from the Raiders playoff game in 1980, to "The Drive" game when Elway and the Broncos burned them in the 1986 AFC Championship Game, to "The Fumble" in the AFC Championship Game the next season. True, this was not a playoff game. But Cleveland should have been 2-0 right now, that game should have been a win. I remember the Giants flirted with disaster once in the Super Bowl vby scoring a touchdown, when they left a scary amount of time left on the clock for Tom Brady and the Patriots to work with. But they held and won. Leave it to the Browns to have one of the lowlights of that game, and surely of this season, if not recent history, to be a touchdown that they actually scored. It left too much time left in the game, but what were the chances that the lowly Jets score two touchdowns inside of the final two minutes of play? But the extra point sailed wide, and the Jets quickly scored one and then two touchdowns, for a remarkable comeback win.
Devastating.
So I would love to pick the Browns in this one. Sorry, I thought I might get to like the Steelers again once "Big Ben" was gone, since I really could not stand him. However, I find myself tired of them dominating this division, with the Ravens also holding their own, sometimes winning the division and even Super Bowls. But the two Ohio teams seem cursed. Even when they enjoy success, like the Browns did two seasons ago in finally beating the Steelers in Pittsburgh and knocking them out of the playoffs, or the Bengals division win and remarkable run to the Super Bowl last season, it feels almost fluky and short-lived. The Bengals hardly look like the team that almost won the Super Bowl, having dropped their first two games already. And the Browns seem to have returned back to mediocrity.
That is why I have to pick the Steelers to win, despite not being excited at all by the prospect of Pittsburgh once again returning to their old status as the team that particularly torments the two Ohio teams. It would be nice to see the Browns bounce back from that devastating loss last week. But I just don't see it, unfortunately.
My pick: Pittsburgh
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