Getting to Brady quickly and often best bets for Steelers defense

Presuming the New England Patriots no longer illegally tape their opponents’ defensive signals and know what is coming, how do the Steelers get to Tom Brady Thursday night?

It might be the only chance they have because if Brady, who is said to get rid of the ball faster than any quarterback in the league, is given time, the Steelers will do the crime. Their pass-rushers say they have confidence their secondary will cover well enough to give them time to get to Brady. They may be the only ones who feel that way.

“It’s hard man, you just have to continue to work the pass rush,” said Jarvis Jones, who has the main pass-rush job as their starting right outside linebacker. “Our DBs have to do a great job on the back end and make him hold it a little longer. We just have to get him on the ground, disrupt him up front, push the pocket, try to get him out of his (comfort zone) a little bit.”

Their secondary has not only been in a state of flux, it has not performed well for several years. It did nothing this summer to engender any confidence that it can hold the coverage long enough for their pass-rushers to put enough heat on Brady to throw him off their game. Now it appears that two young players they were counting on in that secondary, safety Shamarko Thomas and cornerback Cortez Allen, may have lost their starting jobs.

Their secondary would appear to be in shambles.

“Everybody is entitled to an opinion, so good for them,” starting left outside linebacker Arthur Moats said. “We know what we’re capable of dong. We may surprise the outside world but we won’t surprise ourselves.”

James Harrison, who still looks like the Steelers best pass rusher, believes getting Brady out of his rhythm will be their most important job, whether it’s sacking him or just disrupting his flow.

“He gets rid of the ball real quick, so we’re going to have to try to do a lot of things to mess up their timing and, hopefully, just play a great game.

“If you disrupt the timing for somebody that’s built on ‘one, two, get it out,’ then yeah, that’s going to hurt because now they have to pat the ball and hold it a little bit longer and that gives your rush time to get there.”

Not only are the Steelers dealing with a patchwork secondary, they have little proof their pass rush will be any better than last season when their 33 sacks were a quarter-century low and ranked 26th in the league.

Jones remains an unknown after the promising start of his second season was derailed by a severe wrist injury in his third game. Moats has nine sacks in five NFL seasons, although four came in a part-time role with the Steelers in 2014. Bud Dupree is a rookie.

Defensive end Cam Heyward tied for the team lead with 7.5 sacks and he and Stephon Tuitt are being asked to get to the quarterback more often in Keith Butler’s new defensive philosophy.

Brady picked apart their 2013 defense, what might he do Thursday night?

“Obviously, with him getting rid of the ball in two seconds I think they said it is, you can’t get frustrated,” Moats said. “You’re going to have times when you have a good rush and beat a guy, but he gets rid of it. The biggest thing is you know he’s going to hold the ball in certain situations, you have to capitalize on it.

“You have to get to him, you have to create turnovers. Just make him move his feet, that’s with any quarterback we play. That’s going to be our goal, make sure we keep him on the move and make sure we’re hitting him.”

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