Raiders vs. Steelers: Grades, Notes and Quotes for Pittsburgh

Where do we even begin with this game?

How about here? Antonio Brown is an absolute freak-of-nature wide receiver.

Taking on an Oakland Raiders secondary that allowed the third-most passing yards in the NFL coming in, the Raiders allowed Brown to haul in 17 passes for a career-high (and Steelers franchise record) 284 yards in Pittsburgh's 38-35 last-second win over the Raiders on Sunday. As a team, the Steelers threw for 402 yards against the Raiders defense.

Despite winning the game and improving to 5-4, the Steelers lost Ben Roethlisberger to injury once again, this time going down with a left foot injury while being sacked by Oakland's Aldon Smith.

Landry Jones came on in relief and marched the Steelers offense down the field late to lead Pittsburgh to the win. Jones found Brown for a 57-yard gain to put the Steelers in field-goal range, and Chris Boswell nailed an 18-yard field goal to give the Black and Gold the win.

Overall, it was just a weird, wacky game for both teams as there were a combined six turnovers, 1,037 total yards and 73 total points, but at times it appeared neither team wanted to win the game when it was there for the taking.

Luckily for Pittsburgh, Oakland left too much time on the clock following the tying 38-yard scoring strike from Derek Carr to Michael Crabtree, allowing Jones and co. to march down the field to win the game.

Defensively, the Steelers forced three fumbles and picked off Carr once—a huge interception by Ross Cockrell in the end zone late in the fourth quarter—but they gave Oakland too many chances to get back into the game, ultimately allowing them to tie the game.

Carr was terrific all game long, throwing darts all over the field from the pocket as well as on roll-outs, allowing him to showcase his strong arm on the move. He finished with 301 yards passing and four touchdown passes on 24 completions, good for a 96.9 quarterback rating.

Roethlisberger matched Carr throw for throw for the most part, finishing with 334 passing yards and two touchdowns on 24 completions before leaving with the foot injury.

While Brown tore up the Raiders defense through the air, DeAngelo Williams carved up the Raiders run defense to a tune of 170 yards and two touchdowns on 27 carries—a very healthy 6.3 yards-per-carry average.

Losing Le'Veon Bell for the season last week hurt, but Williams has shown in all three games as a starting running back for Pittsburgh he's more than up to the challenge to replace Bell.

With Brown and Williams leading the way offensively, Mike Mitchell and Will Allen came up with big plays all day against the Raiders. The safety duo brought the wood today against the Raiders, coming up with multiple big hits to jar the ball loose for a fumble and numerous incompletions.

The performance by those two was reminiscent of former Steelers safeties Ryan Clark and Troy Polamalu flying around and making plays during the mid-2000s.

This was a big win for Pittsburgh in a must-win game at this point in the season. You saw the physicality, urgency and determination throughout, but there is still plenty to work on in terms of execution on both sides of the ball.

Position Grades for Pittsburgh

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Position	Grade
QB	B-
RB	A
WR	A
TE	B
OL	B-
DL	C-
LB	D
DB	B-
Special Teams	C
Coaching	B

Roethlisberger wasn't very sharp today, but he was able to gut it out for the Steelers, leading a productive offense up and down the field for much of the day, throwing for 334 yards and two touchdowns, but he threw an ugly pick in the third quarter while trying to force a throw to Antonio Brown.

Once Roethlisberger had to leave the game, Landry Jones came in and threw the ball very well. On six attempts, Jones completed four of them for 79 yards, including the big 57-yard connection with Brown late in the fourth quarter to set up the game-winning field goal.

DeAngelo Williams continues to look really good with the Steelers, showing he still has plenty of tread left on his tires at 32 years old.

Showing great vision, balance, burst and strength after initial contact, Williams bulled his way to 170 yards and two touchdowns on 27 carries, and he even added 55 yards receiving on two catches to provide the Steelers with a dynamic weapon out of the backfield in the passing game, a la Le'Veon Bell.

While Brown stole the show through the air against the porous Raiders secondary that featured a ton of ill-advised man coverage, Martavis Bryant added a beautiful 14-yard touchdown that showcased his speed and elusiveness along the right sideline.

Markus Wheaton continues to struggle for the Steelers, looking lost on routes, dropping some passes and lacking timing with Roethlisberger.

At tight end, Heath Miller hauled in three passes for 32 yards and was once again a tremendous blocker in the running game, but it was the rookie, Jesse James, who came up with two huge plays in the third quarter.

James came up with the key block on Bryant's touchdown, and then added a four-yard touchdown—the first of his career—to give the Steelers a 35-21 lead.

Along the offensive line, the big guys opened up great rushing lanes for Williams and provided good protection for Roethlisberger and Jones, but it was the sack allowed by Alejandro Villanueva that knocked Roethlisberger out of the game.

Villanueva stood straight up out of his crouch, allowing Aldon Smith to gain leverage, walking the left tackle back into Roethlisberger's lap, which forced the quarterback to try and scramble to his left.

Smith was able to quickly disengage Villanueva to bring down Roethlisberger. Unfortunately, Smith landed on top of Roethlisberger's left foot in an awkward position.

David DeCastro came up with a huge block on Williams' 53-yard run in the third quarter, and Marcus Gilbert did a good job of nullifying Khalil Mack for much of the day.

The defensive line was relatively quiet today, but Cam Heyward was able to come up with eight tackles and a tackle for a loss one day after the birth of his son.

Pittsburgh's linebackers really struggled in coverage as Lawrence Timmons was burned twice in coverage, while the Steelers' pass-rushers failed to get pressure on Raiders quarterback Derek Carr for much of the day.

Antwon Blake had his ups and downs in this game, as did Ross Cockrell, but it was the play of Mike Mitchell and Will Allen at safety that really carried the defense.

Those two set the tone early in the secondary, lowering the boom whenever they could on the Raiders' skilled players.

Chris Boswell did miss his first kick as a Steeler, but he redeemed himself with the game-winning chip shot from 18 yards out.

Brown Sets Franchise Record

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It's a major understatement to say Antonio Brown was completely unstoppable today.

Brown hauled in 17 passes for a franchise-record 284 yards in the win. In addition to the single-game franchise receiving mark, Brown also set a new franchise record for total yards from scrimmage in a game with 306 yards.

For a few weeks when Roethlisberger was out with the knee injury, Brown was a shadow of himself. But in the last three games Brown has gotten back to the dominant ways that have made him one of the top receivers in the NFL.

Brown, Williams Lead Steelers Offense

Associated Press

It doesn't happen very often in the NFL—if at all—when two players (excluding a quarterback) combine to have more than 85 percent of their team's total yards of offense in a win.

Well, that's just what Antonio Brown and DeAngelo Williams did against the Raiders. The two combined for 531 of the Steelers' 597 yards of total offense in the 38-35 win over the Raiders. That's roughly 88 percent of the total yardage the Steelers put up today.

Oakland had no answer for either of the Steelers' two main offensive weapons.

With the damage Brown and Williams combined to do today, that only bodes well for the Steelers moving forward.

Roethlisberger Leaves with Injury

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It's been a horrific season for the Steelers in terms of injury.

Le'Veon Bell, Maurkice Pouncey, Kelvin Beachum and Roethlisberger have all missed significant time this season. Beachum, Bell and Pouncey are all out for the year, and now Roethlisberger could be facing another long-term break from action after suffering a left foot injury.

Roethlisberger had just returned from a left knee injury just last week against the Cincinnati Bengals, and now he's hurt again.

Just a tough, tough year for the Steelers and the injury bug.

Update: Per ESPN's Adam Schefter, Roethlisberger has been diagnosed with a mid-foot sprain and is expected to miss "a few weeks." Great news for the Steelers.

Mitchell on Big Plays, Criticism

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Mike Mitchell is turning into quite the player for the Pittsburgh Steelers, but there are still plenty of times when he continues to do dumb things, like celebrating a big hit on Latavius Murray while failing to react to the forced fumble. (Not seeing the severity of Murray's injury didn't help the optics, either).

He sets himself up for a fair share of criticism when he does something stupid like this, but then he creates even more room for criticism with quotes like this, per the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review's Chris Adamski:

"I'm just a passionate football player... if you don't want to see me all excited, don't let me make plays."

For once, it would be nice if he just focused on playing football and not celebrating and running his mouth. Very good football player, but not the most tactful person in the world.