STEELERS Big Ben proclaims Brady's greatness

Three Super Bowl rings and two game MVP awards back his claim.
SCRIPPS HOWARD NEWS SERVICE
PITTSBURGH -- Ben Roethlisberger has the best record of any quarterback in the NFL. Peyton Manning owns the touchdown record. Michael Vick generates the most excitement.
But who is the best quarterback?
"People say Manning," Roethlisberger said this week, but then he added his own opinion: "Tom Brady is, by far, the best quarterback in the NFL."
At 29, Brady owns three Super Bowl rings and earned the game's MVP award twice. The Steelers know as well as any team how good he is because they're 1-3 against him, including two AFC championship game losses in Heinz Field.
Yet they intercepted two of his passes and sacked him four times in a 34-20 Steelers victory Oct. 31 in Heinz Field, and they think they can do it again Sunday.
"Yeah, I think he can be rattled. Anybody in this league can be rattled," linebacker Joey Porter said. "I don't want to say he's that cool. Yeah, he definitely can be rattled; we rattled him before.
"When you get after a guy like that you want to get after him early, put him in a hole where he has to do something he really doesn't want to do. Nobody wants to have to pass the ball every play if the defense knows you're going to pass, because now you're in our favor."
Passing dilemma
That's precisely what Brady had to do on Halloween last year in Heinz Field for a few reasons: halfback Corey Dillon didn't play and the Steelers jumped to a 21-3 lead in the first quarter on two touchdown passes to Plaxico Burress and cornerback Deshea Townsend's 39-yard interception return for a score.
The Patriots ran only six times in that game and Brady threw 43 passes.
It was different in the title game Jan. 23. Dillon played and ran 24 times for 73 yards. New England struck early in that game as Deion Branch caught a 60-yard touchdown pass and hauled in another deep one to set up a second touchdown.
Then safety Rodney Harrison polished off the first half with an 87-yard interception return for a touchdown and a 24-3 Patriots halftime lead.
The trick in this game, it seems, is for one team get on top early and hang on. The Steelers' secondary knows that Brady would like to duplicate his first quarter from Jan. 23.
"Being a cornerback or safety, you have to expect the deep ball a couple times in the game," cornerback Ike Taylor said.
Delayed safeties
Play-fakes to Dillon in that title game set up both deep passes to Branch. Each time, the safety was late arriving playing a cover-2 zone, once over Chris Hope and the other over Troy Polamalu.
"They caught me on one of them and Troy on one of them," Hope said. "They made great plays, great passes. The time I got beat I should have taken a better angle. It's not like we were nosey or in the backfield or nothing. They have a great team and they made a great play."
Dillon, who rushed for 1,635 yards in his first season with the Patriots, gives them a dimension they did not have on Halloween last year.
Even though he averaged just 3.0 yards a carry in the championship game, his presence made the play-action passing game work, something the Patriots missed in their regular season appearance in Heinz Field.
"That's our first goal, to stop Corey Dillon and put the game in Brady's hands," Porter said. "We're going to try to stop the run and make Brady pass it."
That might fall into the category of beware what you wish for.
"The simple truth is, you have to stop both of them," Steelers defensive coordinator Dick LeBeau said. "You can't let either one of them control the game or you're going to be in trouble."