Sean's Random Thoughts On The Steelers-Chiefs Game

The Pittsburgh Steelers won big against the Kansas City Chiefs on Sunday night, and while you've probably already read everything about the game, here are my random thoughts that you won't see anywhere else.

- The Sunday night game overlapped with the start of Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish new year, which started at sundown. I'm actually surprised that there was no mention of Kansas City offensive lineman Mitchell Schwartz being Jewish and playing on Rosh Hashanah. You're probably thinking, well, what's the point of identifying someone's religion? It's not like NBC has the players say their names, colleges (or high schools), and religion.



(In this scenario, would Ike Taylor's swaggin' be appropriate for both the "college" and religion? Would he have to say swaggin' twice or is once enough? Or if he's Baptist would he say "Ike Taylor, Swaggin' (pause) Baptist.")

Anyway, you're also thinking, wait, Al Michaels mentioned that Schwartz left the Cleveland Browns, so that's already a great way for him to celebrate the new year. (Actually, you're probably not thinking about Schwartz at all.) Well yes, but Rosh Hashanah is a big deal. Plus Schwartz and his brother recently published a book about playing in the NFL and their Jewishness, so that could be worthy of a 10-second mention. Based on this Times of Israel article, it's not like he's hiding his religion. Michaels could have said "Happy New Year to Mitchell Schwartz and everyone else celebrating."

- I love the following quote by Michaels later in the telecast: "That time James Harrison, the ageless one at the age of 38, put the heat on."

You can't be ageless and 38! 38 is an age, not ageless.

- Apparently, to demonstrate the intelligence of Chiefs QB Alex Smith, Michaels mentioned that as an economics major at the University of Utah, Smith had a 3.74 GPA. Is there a certain point where you shouldn't discuss someone's GPA? If he's a recent college graduate interviewing for a job, highlighting the GPA is acceptable. However, Smith graduated from college more than 10 years ago!

- Alejandro Villanueva was featured in this USAA commercial. Based on how many commercials he's in lately, I'm still waiting for the version where Antonio Brown appears.



- Speaking of Brown, apparently, he got permission from the NFL to wear cleats honoring the late Arnold Palmer. The NFL needs to do some explaining here. Last year, the league fined DeAngelo Williams for having "Find the Cure" in his eye black in honor of breast cancer awareness and William Gay for wearing purple cleats to show support for domestic violence awareness. Nothing against the great Arnold Palmer, but the league saying that Palmer is more important than these issues. Either have a uniform policy or don't.

- One quick football note. On both of the long touchdown passes to Brown and Darrius Heyward-Bey, the Chiefs defenders went to cover Xavier Grimble. Xavier Grimble is now THE ULTIMATE DECOY!

Happy New Year & Go Steelers!