Most of yinz are going to read the title and think I’m talking about the overturned Jesse James touchdown or the missed holding on Eli Rogers on the Steelers final play Sunday.

While those amount to small pieces in my grand scheme of frustration with the New England Patriots, that’s not the full or deciding factor in my disgust with losing to Tom Brady and company. Yes, it may be the icing on the cake, the tip of the iceberg which brought me to vent in this article, but the tried and true reason why I’m losing my mind over this Steelers loss is on a much larger scale: just how often do the Patriots appear to get lucky?

Over the course of the last two seasons, the Steelers and Patriots have played each other three times. I made light of the previous handicaps the Steelers had against their AFC nemesis. It seems as if each time Pittsburgh gets a crack at New England, they are missing key components to come away with a victory.

Last year in the regular season, the Steelers were without Ben Roethlisberger. In the AFC Championship they lost Le’Veon Bell in the first quarter, and ditto with losing Antonio Brown Sunday afternoon.

You can’t have Killer B’s without those B’s on the field. But then include the loss of other starters in those games, such as Cameron Heyward, Bud Dupree, Marcus Gilbert, and most recently, Ryan Shazier and Joe Haden, and you get this sense that the Steelers are always playing with a man down.

Embed from Getty Images

Okay, okay. Granted, the Patriots played the AFC title game without Rob Gronkowski and they played Sunday without Julian Edelman among others. Every team in the NFL deals with injuries, but it’s the manner in which a wounded Steelers team always comes out with the short end of the stick in each of those contests.

However, let’s just take it a step further. I know most of yinz are football fans in general and with the Patriots playing their fair amount of primetime games, I’m sure you’ve seen some of the luck this team has had all season. (If you can call it “luck” that is.)

The first of those “lucky” plays came in Week 3 against the Houston Texans. With less than a minute remaining in the game, Tom Brady connects with Brandin Cooks on a deep, game-winning touchdown pass.

Or does he?

https://twitter.com/steelcityundrgr/status/942748408477110272

The Patriots win the game by three points.

Two weeks later, New England travels to Tampa Bay to face the Buccaneers on Thursday Night Football. Thursday games generally favor the home team on the short week, and should’ve, if Bucs kicker Nick Folk had converted on ANY of his three field goal attempts!

One of those attempts was a 56-yarder, but the others were from 49 and 31. I’m not going to say those are chip shots, as we’ve seen NFL kickers miss extra points this season, but those could’ve been difference makers in a 19-14, six-point Patriots win. (Especially when Patriots kicker Stephen Gostkowski hits four field goals, two of which were from 45 yards plus!)

The very next week the Patriots escape on the road once again with a seven-point win against the New York Jets. And yes, there was controversy in this game as well:

Austin Seferian Jenkins bobbles the ball BUT THEN regains possession as he is in the air BEFORE his is out of bounds. Bogus call @NFL pic.twitter.com/byJF4rnlpi

— Joe Blewett (@Joerb31) October 17, 2017

This isn’t the best clip of the play, but essentially a Jets touchdown was changed to a turnover via touchback in very much the same fashion as Jesse James non-TD Sunday! New England gets the ball, and the W after this insane replay decision.

Then you arrive at Sunday’s calls and no calls, officiated by a crew that has thrown the most flags this season, and has had three of the four most-penalized games of 2017.

Pile that on top of headsets not working at Foxboro, Deflategate, Spygate, and any other gate you can come across, and it’s not that New England wins which makes them despised and makes fans who lose to them disgusted; rather, it’s the manner in which those victories occur.

That’s why I’m disgusted with the Steelers loss to the Patriots. But don’t worry: they may get a chance for revenge soon enough!