- Business as usual: Coach Mike Tomlin doesn't see the Steelers approach changing in practice this week just because it's the playoffs, because the way he operates, that playoff mentality is a weekly occurrence.
"It's business as usual for us," said Tomlin. "I would like to think you have a certain amount of urgency every week. That's life in the National Football League. You only get 16 opportunities to state a case for this single elimination tournament. You could say in a lot of ways we have been in the single elimination tournament for a long time."
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Football immortality:** Antonio Brown lost out on being the NFL's leader in receptions, as Arizona's Larry Fitzgerald edged him out with 107 receptions to Brown's 106. And he missed out on the milestone because he didn't play against the Cleveland Browns, instead being inactive to keep him healthy for Sunday's Wild Card Playoff game against the Miami Dolphins. But it didn't bother him, as he said winning a Super Bowl is what it's all about.
"It's awesome to hear him say that," said Tomlin. "We have had quite a few discussions over the years about that. How many balls can you catch, 110, 125? At the end of the day he is dynamic. He steps in a stadium, he is a guy you better be prepared to reckon with. What he is chasing is a little bit of football immortality. It's legacy. Those things are involving championship and championship play."
Snap count: It's the time of year when you start to hear about the 'rookie wall,' where young players who are accustomed to a college season have played 20 games, with more to come. A lot of it comes from the amount of time they have been on the field, and Tomlin said in the case of Artie Burns, Sean Davis and Javon Hargrave, not starting from Day 1 should help them.
"They haven't been starters the entire season," said Tomlin. "That is an element of it. When you look at that erosion, it's usually centered around snap count. All three of those guys haven't been starters all year. I think their snap count is reflective of that. I would imagine that nobody in that group has much more than 550 like snaps. From that perspective I am less worried about it than I would be if they were sitting at 1,000 snaps or something that a wire-to-wire starter would be."
