Does the media protect the Steelers more than others?

CBS Sports’ Aditi Kinkhabwala was on a recent edition of the Ultimate Cleveland Sports Show. She’s a veteran of covering the Steelers and the AFC North for the NFL Network. During the episode, one of the hosts advanced the opinion that the Cleveland Browns are criticized in that city less frequently and less severely than the Cavaliers or Guardians are.

“In the city of Pittsburgh, it’s the same,” Kinkhabwala replied. “The fans go way easier on the Steelers organization and are way more protective of Steelers players than, I would say, they are of the Pens and the Pirates.”

I don’t know if that’s an accurate representation of how things are in Cleveland. I can’t advance a hot take there.

However, I have a way different opinion of how that dynamic is here. I don’t think the fans are easier on the Steelers than they are on the Penguins or Pirates.

In fact, many in the national media frequently act like they have to be guardians at the gate to protect coach Mike Tomlin and the Steelers organization from a local media contingent and fan base that they frequently deem to be too harsh since (as some of you may have heard), “Tomlin has never had a losing season.”

Now, to be fair to Kinkhabwala’s stance, do the Steelers have sacred players that the fans and media never criticize — i.e. stars that are beyond reproach even when they don’t perform well?

Sure they do. Currently, Minkah Fitzpatrick, T.J. Watt and Cameron Heyward leap to mind. Troy Polamalu, James Farrior, Jerome Bettis, Hines Ward, Heath Miller, and early-years Ben Roethlisberger do as well if you want to go back to the embryonic days of Acrisure Stadium.

Do local fans and media conveniently scapegoat others on the team and blame them for everything under the sun as a way to compensate?

Obviously, yes. Kordell Stewart, Bud Dupree, a young Plaxico Burress, Pressley Harvin, Chase Claypool, Todd Haley and Matt Canada would surely echo that sentiment.

But, no, the Steelers are not protected more than the Pirates or Penguins. It’s the NFL team in an NFL town. More people care about football here than they do any other sport. Hence, they catch more heat more often than the other two clubs.

Granted, after seven years without a playoff win, you could argue it should be even more heat than what it is. But the Steelers still take plenty of punches.

The Pirates do, too. Usually, it’s ownership and management that absorbs the brunt. Rightfully so.

In most Major League Baseball cities, they’d get even more guff — as would the individual players. Unfortunately, failing to witness a division winner since 1992 or a World Series champion since 1979 would dull the interest of even the most passionate and critical observers.

If any of the three teams in Pittsburgh should be labeled as protected or shielded from criticism, it’s the Penguins. Five Stanley Cups, six conference playoff crowns and 27 playoff berths since 1991 will build up some deserved cache with the fans and media.

The problem is the organization hasn’t enjoyed a playoff series win since 2018. Sidney Crosby has been in this town since 2005-06. The next serious rebuke he faces will be the first. Many of the fans and media here cosigned on the decision to keep the team’s aging core together a few years ago because they’ve so long been adored by the fanbase.

Ownership was largely immune from criticism — so long as that owner’s name began with the letter “M” and ended with “ario Lemieux.”

Maybe not so much now. No doubt, some Penguins get scapegoated just like frequent Steelers targets do.

Any assistant coach who runs the power play. Any goaltender. Any highpriced defenseman who was signed from another team in free agency (see Ryan Graves, Paul Martin and Sergei Gonchar when they first arrived).

Or any general manager who happened to be a Philadelphia Flyer when he was a player.

Does anyone like that come to mind? To my previous point about the Steelers, though, when the football team’s offensive coordinator gets the same treatment at the hockey team’s rink as the franchise’s own stumblebum G.M. does, that kinda proves my argument.

If Kinkhabwala’s larger argument is that the Steelers are protected more than they should, then, yes. I agree.

But to say that phenomenon is disproportionate to the other two pro teams in town is way off the mark.