Myles Garrett can keep his Halloween decorations, according to Ben Roethlisberger.
The Steelers quarterback is just glad to have gotten a 15-10 Halloween win over Garrett and the Browns on Sunday at FirstEnergy Stadium.
In case you missed it, earlier this month, Garrett decorated his front yard with the tombstones of NFL quarterbacks, including Roethlisberger. Garrett at the time described himself as “kind of a troll,” but on Sunday, it was Roethlisberger who got to do some trolling.
“Myles is a special talent, and I told him after the game that he can take the tombstone from his yard, but I will take the win, Roethlisberger said. “He is special. I thought Dan (Moore Jr., Steelers offensive tackle) did a great job. I think Myles had one sack, maybe two, I don’t even know. It is tough to ask a rookie to go against that guy, and what he did today was pretty special. I can’t say enough about the line — run game and pass pro, they are the heart of this group.”
In addition to the graveyard, Garrett showed up to Sunday’s game dressed as the Grim Reaper — or perhaps, more aptly the QB reaper, considering he donned a cape with the names of all the quarterbacks he’s sacked.
Despite the loss, Garrett did still get to Roethlisberger on Sunday, sacking him in the second quarter. In their five career meetings, Garrett has sacked the Steelers QB five times, strip sacked him once, and forced him to fumble twice.
For the season, Garrett now has 10.5 sacks and still leads the league.
Earlier in the week, Garrett spoke about wanting to take Roethlisberger down in what could be his final game in Cleveland, and how badly he wanted to send him out of FirstEnergy Stadium with a loss. While the Browns couldn’t accomplish the latter, Garrett already alluded to looking forward to Cleveland’s Week 17 road game against Pittsburgh.
“The man has been great for a long time, and he has been great here for a long time,” Garrett said. “It is tough, but we will see him again, and we will get the chance to return the favor when he is at his house. It hurts that we could not protect our house, but his home is not safe either.”
Roethlisberger moves to 12-2-1 at FirstEnergy Stadium and improves to 24-2-1 overall against the Browns. He ended the game with 266 yards on 22-of-34 passing with one touchdown. Fifty of those yards came during the final drive of the game as Roethlisberger connected with Diontae Johnson for a huge gain.
True to his recent form, Roethlisberger made a concerted effort to get the ball out to his teammates quickly. When he didn’t, Garrett said he felt like the Steelers made adjustments to limit him getting to Roethlisberger.
“In my first couple of years in the league playing against Ben, he would hold onto the ball,” Garrett said. “Nowadays, he is trying to get it out of his hand and get it to his playmakers. There were a couple of plays where they were longer developing or it felt like to me that there were a lot of reads to the tight end or halfback on my side to try and chip me or wide me out so it would take a longer time to get to the quarterback.”
At the end of the afternoon, Roethlisberger may have gotten the last laugh, but in actuality, all that matters to him is getting the win.
“Like I said, that is all the matters,” Roethlisberger said. “I don’t care about anything else. He is a heck of a football player. He got a sack — good for him — but we got the win.”
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