Aug 13, 2016 4 min read

Where was everybody?

The Steelers played the Detroit Lions in an exhibition game Friday night and hardly anybody showed up. Oh, the box score said 44,000 and change, but somebody made that number up. When the Lions kicked off at 7:05 p.m., there were at least twice as many empty seats as people.

There was a time when the Steelers first preseason game was a big deal. People were hungry for football. Not anymore.

Maybe the fans have finally caught on. The announcement was made early in the week that Ben Roethlisberger, Antonio Brown and Le’Veon Bell wouldn’t be playing, which is a lot like the Beatles announcing a few days before a concert that John, Paul and Ringo would be sitting this one out.

For some reason, there was no announcement about refunds to the people who had actually paid real money for tickets.

And, based on the number of empty seats, a lot of the people who bought tickets had trouble giving them away. Apparently, nobody saw the NFL Network’s promo Thursday night during the Saints-Patriots game telling people to tune in as “Ben Roethlisberger and the Steelers take on the Detroit Lions.”

“As Landry Jones and the Steelers take on the Detroit Lions,” wouldn’t have had the same ring to it.

Everybody but the card-carrying members of the National Football League Players Association believes the NFL should get rid of at least two of the exhibition games and play an 18-game regular season, but the league owners haven’t figured out a way to talk them into it yet.

Perhaps they’d go for the extra two games if the league stopped testing for marijuana.

Something needs to be done. Fans staying away in large numbers the way they did Friday night is a good start.

Even though fans are forced to buy two exhibition games – now at a lower cost than regular season tickets – if they want their season tickets and the owners actually get the same return on an empty seat that they get from a warm body, empty stadiums are an embarrassment and empty seats don’t buy beer.

The Steelers’ next home game is Thursday against against the Eagles. If you hurry, you can get 50-yard line tickets on-line for $13. Actually, you probably don’t have to hurry. I’ll bet they’ll be down to $10 outside Heinz Field at game time.

• The game was what you should have come to expect from the exhibition opener – extremely boring. The best news for both teams was that no stars were seriously injured. Not suiting up tends to greatly reduce a guy’s chances of getting hurt.

• The Steelers’ defense will have to wait until the third exhibition game to find out if it can deal with a first-string NFL quarterback.

Starters tend to play at least a half in the third game and that means Drew Brees and the Saints’ first-team offense should get some serious work.

Last season, the Steelers defense put up some bad numbers despite seeing Matt Hasselback, A.J. McCarron, Brock Osweiler, Ryan Mallett – who actually beat them – and Austin Davis in their last five games. I’ll let you see if you can match the quarterback with the team without looking it up.

McCarron you might remember. They faced him twice. The first time was early in Game 13 after Cincinnati starter, Andy Dalton, injured his finger making a tackle following an interception.

They saw McCarron in the playoffs, too and would have lost to him if not for Vontaze Burfict and Adam Jones committing the two dumbest penalties in NFL post season history.

If the Steelers aren’t as lucky this season and have to face real NFL quarterbacks in the second half, the defense will be tested.

This season, the Steelers are scheduled to face quarterbacks named Brady, Flacco, Romo, Luck and (Eli) Manning.

That might require at least 30 points a game from the offense and that’s not going to happen if Landry Jones is asked to do anything other than mop up.

John Steigerwald writes a Sunday sports column for the Observer-Reporter.