Kovacevic: What if the Steelers' main offensive guys ... just aren't good?

It sure wasn't the officials.

Oh, they were brutal beyond words, Alan Eck's crew. Misplaced spots. Misapplied rules. Misjudged multiple pass-interference calls. Missed a late hit that hurt Kenny Pickett, even as protecting quarterbacks is supposed to be peak priority. Heck, they messed up a simple 10-second clock reset, asking the operator for a new time that'd actually subtract 12. 

Thing is, despite Diontae Johnson's blistering criticism afterward that "the refs were killing us the whole game," the brutality was applied pretty much evenly throughout the Steelers being beaten by the Jaguars, 20-10, on this Sunday afternoon at Acrisure Stadium, with each side being flagged six times and Jacksonville for 20 additional yards.

So go right ahead and vent, like Mike Tomlin did ...

... after Chris Boswell's 55-yard field goal near the end of the first half was nullified by what Eck bizarrely called "offside on the right guard." Boswell had to retry from 61 and went wide right for his first miss of the season, and the Steelers' deficit at the intermission was six rather than three. Tomlin would say afterward, "I hadn't seen that called in 17 years of standing on the sidelines," and there's cause for that:

Oops.

But again, that ain't it. No matter how much fussing and fuming it'll generate across the Nation these next couple days. Not principally, anyway.

Don't grasp at the injuries, either. Yeah, Minkah Fitzpatrick went down. Then Kenny went down. And Cam Heyward and Pat Freiermuth have been out a while. But that's not much different than most NFL active rosters on a given weekend. It really isn't. 

No, think of this, instead, like a progression in a collegiate logic class:

• The Steelers' defense forced three Jacksonville turnovers on two fumble recoveries and an interception.

• The Steelers' defense kept the Jaguars out of the end zone on all three trips to the red zone.

• The Steelers' defense sacked Trevor Lawrence three times for 21 yards in losses, hit him six times, broke up two of his passes and registered three other tackles for losses.

• The Steelers ... lost by 10.

Now, which of those, the pretend professor asks, doesn't align with the rest?

Let me blunt: This offense is a joke. Not just because it ranks 31st in the 32-team NFL. Not just because it's equally bad, and strikingly so, at both passing and running. Not just because it scarcely squeezes what's there from whatever top-tier talent's actually at hand. (Read: George Pickens.)

No, it's because, at its rock-bottom points, meaning any first quarter in any week, it's outright embarrassing. It's four straight three-and-outs to open this game. It's 12 total snaps that spanned 9 total yards. It's ... whatever the hell this was:

Believe it or not, even though that sideways gem was the one that triggered the loudest round of 'FIRE MATT CANADA!' chants from the 67,225 on hand, no, I don't have another Canada screed coming. Not this week. Don't get me wrong: He's still a problem and a half, and he should've been fired forever ago. But Canada didn't check down too soon, as Pickett did above, and Canada didn't whiff on his block, as Isaac Seumalo shamefully did above, and Canada didn't make those two awful drops that Johnson had on the first series -- "I don't care if it's raining, or the gloves or wrong or anything," Diontae told me, "I've gotta catch both those balls" -- and Canada didn't script for Pickett to make self-crushing throws like these:

Don't skip those. Press play. Each one. Absorb the real pain, not some rancid reffing.

That last throw, in particular, should've been a tying touchdown. Johnson slipped, but only because he had to lunge back for one of the worst short-range throws any quarterback will make in the league all season. So, rather than an uplifting cap to what would've been a 98-yard drive following all those three-and-outs, rather than Johnson reveling in his first touchdown in two freaking years, a perfectly designed play/route resulted in a wipeout.

That's your quarterback, Pittsburgh. That's where this city's hopes for this offense's revival were placed from the moment his name was called in the draft, and it's now been 19 games that mostly look like what's above but also, occasionally, look like fun-time in the fourth quarter.

That, more than any incompetent coordinator, should terrify this team's fan base. Because if Pickett isn't it, the entire process of replacing Ben Roethlisberger begins anew.

Yes, I'm there. Don't look at me like that. 

Look, it's been 20 games of this now. A 78.0 passer rating. One 300-yard game. One multiple-touchdown game. The big college W over the Yay-School Yahoos in the Some Random Cereal Bowl doesn't count anymore. This is the NFL, which a wise old cowboy once observed stands for 'Not For Long' if one doesn't perform up to par. And aside from the Ws accrued, no part of Pickett's performance has been up to par.

Want to know where else I am?

Man, is this ever getting tired:

In honor of the now tragically lost Matthew Perry, to be read in his 'Chandler Bing' way: Could Najee Harris BE any slower getting to the line?

That run annoyed me at a 'Janice' level:

No, seriously, on the day the Jaguars rode Travis Etienne, the dynamic, indefatigable running back drafted with the very next pick after Harris in 2021, like the horse he's become, all Harris mustered was 13 whole yards on seven whole carries, with a long run of 3, plus a bunch of final-drive catches in garbage time. Quite the contrast against Etienne's 79 yards on the ground, 70 in the air.

For his three-year career, Harris averages 3.8 yards per rushing attempt. And the circumstances and surroundings don't matter: Year by year, that figure's gone from 3.9 to 3.8 to 3.7.

He's just a guy. Nothing more. Not even the best running back on his own roster. And all he's got left of feeling like a first-rounder, I'll bet, is the diva attitude he'll exhibit in the locker room.

I said don't look at me like that.

The players are a problem, both in the short and long terms. The coordinator's a problem. And the one common denominator in this offensive debacle that's now deep into its third year with no end in sight, of course, is the head coach. The one who leads the players, who grooms them and, don't forget, who deals from a heavy hand in drafting them. And he, apparently, thinks he can just hope that the subject goes away.

When I asked Tomlin, for instance, how much all those early three-and-outs impacted the rest of the game, including his defense, this came back:

"The early portion of the game doesn't decide the outcome," he'd reply. "It doesn't. It usually doesn't. It didn't today. Obviously, you want more fluid starts, but it didn't determine the outcome of the game. I thought the critical things were the things that transpired in the second half."

Respectfully ... wow, no. 

This isn't about what decides one outcome. It's about addressing -- responsibly, directly, emphatically, on all fronts -- the single greatest problem these Steelers face, now and for the foreseeable future. And if the dominant figure atop the football operation is so immersed in the moments of the last bad things he sees in a close loss that he can't or won't accept that it's the offense doing all the damage ... yeah, I've got nothing.

Maybe I'll just listen to Elandon Roberts assuring me everything's going to be all right:

“We’re pros, man," he'd say. "Obviously, any loss is emotional. But, s---, we’ve got a Thursday night game against Tennessee. We have no time to be whining. We’ve gotta get in, make the corrections and then we’ve gotta move on quickly. We’ve got Thursday night. We’ve got a great opponent coming in with the Titans. It is what it is. We’ve gotta move on.”

It is what it is. Mm-hm.

OK, better yet, maybe I'll just go about making the most of those two extra seconds the refs granted all of us.

THE ESSENTIALS

• Boxscore
• Live file
• Team feed
• Highlights
• Standings
• Statistics
• Schedule
• Scoreboard

THE IN-GAME INJURIES

• Steelers: QB Kenny Pickett (rib) was hurt in the second quarter, was then reported as 'expected to return' by the team, then out soon thereafter ... FS Minkah Fitzpatrick (hamstring) was hurt in the first quarter, immediately declared doubtful to return, then out soon thereafter ... LT Dan Moore (leg) missed parts of two series in the third quarter after an opponent rolled up on him, but he'd return ... WR Diontae Johnson (chest) missed part of one series in the third quarter while having trouble breathing after a hit, but he'd return.

• Jaguars: None.

Full report on our Steelers Feed.

THE INACTIVES

• Steelers: CB Levi Wallace (foot), OT Dylan Cook, NT Breiden Fehoko, QB Mason Rudolph (emergency)

• Jaguars: SS Andre Cisco, WR Zay Jones, CB Tyson Campbell, OLB Yasir Abdullah, DE Tyler Lacy

THE MULTIMEDIA

THE SCHEDULE

Next two are at home, as well, including a Thursday nighter against the Titans. Oughta be more high-flying fun.

THE CONTENT

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