Rookie returner in the house: Fourth-round draft pick Kaden Wetjen returned a Bills punt 45 yards for a touchdown in the fourth quarter. Drafted as a return specialist, Wetjen flashed his wares against a solid Bills coverage unit that thought it had the rookie bottled up. But Wetjen reversed his field, hit a hole, and found the sideline wide open in putting the Steelers ahead 27-17 with 11:11 to play.
"Sometimes coaches say things on a headset they probably shouldn't say, like 'get north, get north' or 'get vertical,' which I was screaming at him at that time," said head coach Mike McCarthy. "And then he obviously bounced it to the sideline. I saw it on the Jumbotron. I saw why he bounced it, because he didn't have anywhere to go in front of him.
"He's been under some criticism just for being a young guy [on a] veteran team, so some tough love. I'm proud of him. I was really happy to see the return unit get that. Obviously, that was just a heck of a return by him, because if you're grading the tape, the coverage unit was in excellent position right there. And he gets around a corner and, obviously, finishes it off. That was a big-time return."
Keeping four quarterbacks? McCarthy was asked about keeping all four of his quarterbacks on the 53-man roster that will be whittled down through the Aug. 30 deadline.
For all the world, he sounded as if the Steelers will do exactly that.
"That's a very accurate evaluation on your part," McCarthy told the questioner. "Yeah, I feel good about the quarterback room. I've been saying it for quite some time, and they've showed it on the field. We've got two veterans that we can win with, and we've got two young guys that we're really excited about their future."
Only the "two young guys" took snaps in Buffalo. Will Howard played the first half and finished with a passer rating of 83.1.
Drew Allar, a rookie third-round pick, played the second half and finished with a passer rating of 64.1. He wasn't sacked, nor did he turn the ball over.
"I feel good about everything that I put on tape," said Allar. "I think the biggest thing is I have a lot of great mentors between players and coaches to learn from the things I've done well and also the mistakes I've had. There's a great group of veterans around me, Aaron [Rodgers] and Mason [Rudolph] in my room. It kind of extends beyond that between [Michael] Pittman, DK [Metcalf], Pat Freiermuth. There's a lot of great veterans on the offensive side of the ball, specifically, that have been great for me. And I feel like I've learned from the things that I haven't done well and improved upon that."
It's the process that's most important: The Steelers had a number of veterans who didn't play, some in uniform and some not. McCarthy, of course, wanted it that way to give his young players experience hitting the road.
"We're a veteran football team," McCarthy said. "This is the oldest team I've had the privilege to coach as a head coach, but our young guys got to play a ton of ball tonight, and that excites me. I got to see personalities. I got to see guys step up. I got to see interactions. I got to see captains take that role today. And that's all part of growing the whole roster of your team. There are a lot of little things that were evident, just throughout the travel up here last night and so forth. And you learn more, and really, I've learned over time, just to really listen more. Probably having three daughters has helped me there, but I just listen more, observe more, take it in, and I really liked and enjoyed [it] and I'm proud of these guys.
"These guys had to play a lot of football tonight. And a couple guys were really stressed between special teams and offense and defense. So, as a whole, I feel really good about our body of work that we were able to accomplish, not just the quarterbacks. It gives us a chance to set a plan as we go into these next 72 hours and get the roster in the best position we possibly can, but then move on and get ready for Atlanta.
"This was this was a good experience. You want to win a game, because we compete in everything that we do. We compete every single day in everything that we do, and we would've liked to come out of here tonight with the win. But I'm looking forward to watching the tape, looking forward to watching our young guys, because I saw some things that you usually don't see if they didn't get the opportunity that they had today."
Max Iheanachor sees his first action: The Steelers' first-round draft pick missed the first two preseason games with an injury but played Thursday night. He entered at right tackle next to fellow rookie Gennings Dunker. While Dunker went the distance, from start to finish, Iheanachor entered in the second quarter and played a series past his scheduled "pitch count."
McCarthy hesitated to give a detailed review on Iheanachor without watching the tape, but did watch closely on a couple of key plays.
"I got to watch him a couple plays when I knew he was a primary, like the stretch in the outside zone," McCarthy said. "I tried to watch him there. I saw what happened on the sack. I think it was just more his set. He was trying to be too aggressive, almost looked like he was in a three-step set versus a five-step. But other than that, I can only tell you what I heard from the discussion on the sideline.
"I do know this: We wanted to get him about 20 plays tonight. We felt that we got to that point [and] we got him an extra series. But the most important thing is he got to play. He needs to play. So, just the conditioning of it, the speed of it, coming up here and playing on the road, I think, is awesome for a first-time lineman doing that.
"The crowd was good there at the end. I thought the 2-minute drill for our young guys, to hear the crowd noise, was a really good experience. They got to go for it on 4th-and-4. Just a lot of good things that come out for the young guys, especially for Max. He's a young player. He hasn't played a lot of football in his whole career, let alone in the NFL, so it was really good to get them out there."
Ready for the Falcons? The Steelers open the regular season Sept. 13 at home against the Falcons. McCarthy was asked if he's ready, but he referred to the Aug. 30 cut-down date as his present focus.
"I'm anxious about what's in front of me," he said. "I probably won't sleep tonight. I know what [Friday] brings. You want to get it right. I think it's very, very important. And I know the Rooney family feels this way. I think it's so important, particularly when you're continuing the success that's gone on in Pittsburgh and you're starting a new program, and you want to make sure your process is in order. But you've got to make sure we treat people the same way going out as when they come in. There's the right thing to do. This is the way we want to do business, but also the reality of we're working together. I just want to get this thing right. I want to make sure, when the news is delivered, that it's done the right way and that they get their questions answered."
