PITTSBURGH (93.7 The Fan) – He’s the quarterback reportedly Bill Cowher wanted as team president Dan Rooney preferred Ben Roethlisberger in the 2004 NFL Draft. In his first year with the Colts, Philip Rivers leads an AFC South co-leading team into a key game at Heinz Field Sunday.
“Philip Rivers is the field general,” said Steelers head coach Mike Tomlin. “He’s very good not only in terms of what he is able to do for them but what he is able to do for them intellectually getting them in and out of plays as appropriate based on what he sees. He just does a great job of managing a football game.”
Rivers is 3-4 in his career against the Steelers, with 14 touchdown passes to six interceptions. Rivers is completing 68.7% of his passes this year for 3,735 yards, 22 TD and 9 INT.
“He’s been in the league almost as long as I’ve been alive, which is kind of crazy,” said Steelers safety Minkah Fitzpatrick. “There’s not too many things he hasn’t seen before, so our goal is to not outsmart him.”
“Philip knows the game,” said Steelers defensive coordinator Keith Butler, noting he’s the son of a football coach. “He’s been growing up on the game all of his life. He’s very sharp. He does a good job at reading the secondary, getting them in best offensive play they can be in based on the defense or what he sees from the defense. That to me is always the challenge with him. It’s kind of a head game football game that we have to play against him. We have to show him one thing and play another thing, and he will figure it out sometimes. Sometimes, he won’t.”
While a legit criticism of Rivers is never having won a championship, he plays his best football in December. Rivers has 10 more wins in the final month of the season, 44, than he does any other month with 112 touchdown passes.
Rivers was the starting quarterback for Jacksonville’s only win this year, however since mid-October, the Colts are 7-2 and Rivers has 18 touchdown passes to 4 interceptions.
“He’s a very, very, very smart quarterback,” said outside linebacker TJ Watt. “He’s been in the league a long time. He can dissect pressure easily, so it doesn’t matter if you send eight guys. He’s going to get the really quick. I think you have to play the cat-and-mouse game with him a little bit. We will definitely pick-and-chose our shots.”
Not known at all for his running ability, Rivers sacked only 14 times this year and only one time sacked more than twice in a game and had zero sacks in four games.
“It’s going to be a tough deal for us,” Butler said. “He can still throw the ball. He still gets off the ball, gets in a gun and gets the ball out quick and stuff like that. He gets him into the right running game. They have a good running back. He uses them well.”
Jonathan Taylor is a tailback some believed the Steelers were interested in out of Wisconsin. The rookie has rushed for 842 yards, catching 35 passes for another 298 yards. During the Colts three game winning streak, Taylor is averaging 108 yards a game rushing and 6.6 yards a carry.
“This group is a really cohesive unit and they work well off of each other especially in the run game,” Watt said. “They have guards pulling around the edges. They have a great pass pro together. I think the quarterback has a great understanding of where those guys are going to be and visa versa.”
TY Hilton leads the receiving corps with 675 yards, Zach Pascal and Michael Pittman each have over 400 yards this year and tailback Nyheim Hines has 53 receptions.
“For us, we need to start playing our best ball because we have to continually get better every game,” Butler said. “That’s offense, defense and special teams, for all of us. We, all of us, have to do that. Going into this game, I think this is one of the better football teams we have played in the last three or four opponents that we’ve played. Obviously, next week we have the Browns, but this week, this is a playoff contender right here that we are playing. We have to see where we are at. We have to play well.”
Steelers are back home and playing a traditional time for the first time since before Thanksgiving. A win breaks a three game slide and earns them the AFC North.
“Playing at one o’clock again will be awesome,” Watt said. “It will be nice to be back at Heinz Field. Go up against a really, powerful team. It’s going to be awesome to have a challenge and really excited to get back to playing football and hopefully right the ship this week.”