Steelers Win; Kelly, Reed, Foster Injured

The Buffalo Bills lost quarterback Jim Kelly and wide receivers Andre Reed and Don Beebe to injury while the Pittsburgh Steelers shrugged off Barry Foster’s injury to dominate the defending AFC champions, 23-0, Monday night.

Kelly suffered a concussion when he was slammed to the turf by Kenny Davidson on an 11-yard loss on the next-to-last play of the first half. Reed suffered a broken left wrist and Beebe suffered a concussion in the second half. Frank Reich replaced Kelly.

Foster suffered a badly sprained left ankle while landing awkwardly on an overthrown pass in the first quarter. Leroy Thompson replaced Foster and carried 30 times for 108 yards, including a touchdown. Thompson had 101 yards in the second half against New Orleans on Oct. 17 after Foster left at halftime because of a bruised shoulder.

The Steelers (6-3) stuffed the NFL’s top-rated rushing offense with the league’s top rushing defense, and out-gained the Bills 400-157 overall behind Thompson and quarterback Neil O’Donnell, who was 16 of 27 for 212 yards.

“When you shut out the reigning (AFC) champs, it feels good,” Steeler cornerback D.J. Johnson said. “It shows what we’re capable of when we put an entire game together. This moves us into the upper echelon of teams in the AFC and the NFL.”

Buffalo, last shut out by Miami, 28-0, on Dec. 22, 1985, lost for the first time in six games and fell back into a first-place tie with Miami in the AFC East.

The Steelers, apparently angered by inflammatory pregame comments by Beebe and Bruce Smith, won for the fifth time in six games and now lead Cleveland and Houston by a game in the AFC Central.

“They made some ludicrous comments before the game . . . Beebe said if he played against the Steelers all the time, he’d have 128 touchdown catches,” Johnson said. “(Defensive backs coach) Dick LeBeau told us about it at breakfast and said, ‘Do what you have to do about it.’ ”

Beebe, who had 24 catches in four starts against Pittsburgh, was leveled by safety Gary Jones while catching a pass along the Steelers’ sideline in the second half and didn’t return. Neither did the Bills’ offense.

“It hurts. It hurts your pride to lose like that,” Bill center Kent Hull said. “But it’s happened before to this team.”