What happens if the Steelers end the season on a six-game losing streak? Last year, the minority owners wanted a change after losing to Jacksonville

... they could miss the playoffs -- or have a losing season

Just a few weeks ago, I was an eternal optimist. However, that “eternal” adjective is often elusive when it comes to my beloved Pittsburgh Steelers.

And especially when it comes to Tom Brady and the Patriots, who invade Heinz Field today. We have been especially woeful against them.

Winning streak — and then disaster

If you go back to some earlier posts on this blog, I had laughed at those fans who were predicting that the Steelers would win 13 games this year. I was arguing that the team’s schedule in 2018 was tougher than many thought. In addition, I argued that they were lucky last year as they had to come back late in games against weak competition to build a 13-3 record — only to lose to the Jags at home in the first round of the playoffs.

Still, I did not think that they would tie the Browns in the season opener, though I warned that it might be a tougher game than they were anticipating. A 1-2-1 start was depressing, but then came a winning streak that gave us hope.

Only to then fall into a losing streak of three games entering today’s game. What makes that so woeful is that while the loss to the Chargers was one against one of the best teams in the AFC, the Broncos and Raiders were both under .500. The Raiders had won just two games, now three after a horrible loss by our beloved team.

Tom Brady has owned the Steelers — and Roethlisberger

Before last year’s loss to the Patriots, NFL.com posted a horrible paragraph, albeit one that is true:

“Tom Brady is 10-2 against Pittsburgh in his career (including playoffs), with a 115.1 passer rating. That is the highest mark of any starting quarterback against any single team since 1991 (min. 10 starts). Since 2007, Brady has 324.7 passing yards per game, 22 touchdown passes and zero interceptions against the Steelers.”

Now, of course, after that controversial finish to the last game, Brady is 11-2, and he has lost to Roethlisberger only once, in the latter’s rookie season when the Steeler defense and running game dominated that win at Heinz Field.

Things are so bad in this rivalry that 247.com wrote this about the Pats-Steelers matchups: “It would almost be unfair to call whatever exists between the New England Patriots and Pittsburgh Steelers a rivalry. The Patriots beat the Steelers so often that it just doesn't qualify. Tom Brady is 8-2 against the Steelers in the regular season for his career and 3-0 against them in the postseason. All three playoff matchups were in the AFC Championship Game, and the Patriots won them by 40 combined points. Brady is 6-2 at Heinz Field, where Sunday's matchup will be played and where last season's battle ended on the controversial Jesse James non-catch call that forced the league to make severe rule changes for this season … In other words, the Patriots win close games and they win blowouts. They win in Foxboro and they win in Pittsburgh. But the one consistent truth of Patriots-Steelers games is that eventually, the Patriots will find a way to win almost all of them. ”

Ouch … but that is true. Steelers-Ravens is a rivalry because either team could win. But, even with the help of a horrible rule that allowed a Jesse James TD that should have won last year’s game, the Pats manage to win the close ones.

So, how can the Steelers hope to contend today? Perhaps they can win only with divine intervention.

What happens if they lose the next 3? Owners will be angry

The truth is that the Steelers could very well lose the next two games to fall to 7-7-1 and will probably be trailing the Ravens for the AFC North title race.

In fact, they could easily lose to the Bengals in the season finale if they lose to the Pats and Saints. That would give them a losing record, and would result in some true anger in Steelers Nation — and in the Pittsburgh franchise’s boardroom.

Remember when some of the minority owners last year wanted Mike Tomlin fired after the Jacksonville loss? Well, imagine what they would be saying after he posted his first losing record in history.

Or even think about how they would feel if the Steelers beat the Bengals but still missed the playoffs.

Things may get nasty in the Steeler boardroom — and remember that Art Rooney II owns only 32 percent of the team. He had hoped to have his son replace him, but some of the other owners are Steeler brothers of Dan Rooney who despite him, including Art Jr., whom Dan fired during the 1980s.

Suffice it to say that Art II does not have the support of the Steeler board that he did before all of those minority owners came into play. His job, Tomlin’s, and the GM’s could be on the block.

Probably will not happen, but it could.

I said that the Steelers would never win another Super Bowl as long as Tomlin is the coach -- and that is for his lack of discipline -- but thought that this year he might turn the corner. I still maintain that.