There are big plays in a game, and there are big decisions that lead to big plays. And Rodgers-Cromartie was about to make a decision that he'll regret for a long time, and the Pittsburgh quarterback was about to pull back a pass that'll be the best decision of his NFL career.
On second-and-six, wide receiver Hines Ward, tight end Heath Miller and Washington were flanked left, Moore as a sidecar to the right of Roethlisberger, and Holmes six yards outside the right tackle -- the only receiver to the right. At the snap, Moore slithered out to the right flat, and Holmes did a quick 11-yard curl, sitting at the Cards' 35. Because the Cards sent five rushers and blitzed outside 'backer Okeafor from the left instead of leaving him in coverage on the hot receiver (Moore), Roethlisberger had Moore wide open at the 46, with a few yards of free space in front of him.
"I was getting ready to throw it to Mo,'' Roethlisberger said. "In fact, I was throwing it to him -- but at the last possible second I saw Cromartie sprinting up to cover Mo. He must have been reading my eyes. So I pulled it back. Who knows what would have happened had I thrown that one?''
I'll tell you what: Rodgers-Cromartie would have blasted Moore in his tracks. It would have been a gain of one, maybe, and set up about a third-and-five. But that's what huge hands do for you. Roethlisberger has oversized hands, and when he pumped the ball to Moore, he did more than pump -- he almost let the ball go. But at the last moment he saw the corner coming up and pulled the ball back in.
"Then I looked back at Tone [santonio], and he had some space,'' Roethlisberger said. Big Ben threw to the outside shoulder of Holmes, and Francisco, coming up for the double-coverage, slipped three yards from Holmes. The receiver was off to the races, and Francisco collared him down at the Arizona six.
Pittsburgh took its last timeout. Now the Steelers had a gimme field goal, but no one on the sideline told Roethlisberger to be safe here. Not with 48 seconds left and a fresh set of downs, six yards from the win. It was time to go for the jugular, and Roethlisberger knew it. On first down, he pumped to Miller near the back of the end zone on the right, pulled it back, and let fly for Holmes at the left corner of the end zone. Holmes had beaten Rodgers-Cromartie and Antrel Rolle. The pass was a little high, but Holmes went up, twisted around slightly ... and just couldn't close his hands around the tight spiral.
"I thought I lost the Super Bowl,'' Holmes would say later.
Roethlisberger didn't care. "Tone knew and I knew I'd go back to him,'' he said.
But the next play had Holmes as the third option. "Mo in the flat, Hines on the pick-pivot, Tone in the corner of the end zone,'' Roethlisberger said, running through his options. Cornerback Ralph Brown "kind of jumped the route'' on Moore at the seven; Brown was wavering between Holmes, running for the corner and covered by Rodgers-Cromartie and Francisco.
Ward "was kind of open, and I almost banged it to him'' at the five, with a Card defender on his back," said Roethlisberger. He knew he could have sledgehammered the ball into Ward, but would his receiver have hung onto it or would it have been knocked away? Finally, Roethlisberger took a micro-second and looked at Miller, but he was covered. Now it was back to Holmes. Brown straddled the goal line, waiting for Big Ben's decision, and when he saw Roethlisberger switch his eyes to Holmes quickly and wind up, Brown skittered back.
"It's one of those throws where you just don't think,'' Roethlisberger said. "You're just trying to put it where the receiver can catch it, but if you don't, he's the only one who can catch it. When I let it go, I thought it was his ball or no one's. But a second later, I see the corner [brown] and I think, He's gonna pick it off.''
The ball went five inches, maybe six, over the gloved fingertips of the leaping Brown. Francisco was coming in for the kill shot on Holmes. Rodgers-Cromartie reminded me so much of Asante Samuel on last year's miracle catch by David Tyree -- a spectator, strangely and regrettably, on the biggest play of the season, instead of a mugger as soon as the ball hit Holmes' hands.
Holmes had missed the previous throw. Not this one. Leaning over the white boundary stripe, five feet shy of the end line, Holmes snatched the high ball out of the air and got what -- one, two feet down? The Ultra Slow-Motion camera at NBC director Fred Gaudelli's disposal (the network had three of these artsy cameras in use, two low at either end zone, and one on the 50) dispelled all doubt that Holmes got his right foot down. No way referee Terry McAulay would have been able to overturn the call anyway, but Ultra Slow-Mo assured that the Steelers had their touchdown -- and Roethlisberger his drive for the ages.
When he hugged Holmes, Roethlisberger said to him: "The other catch would have been a lot easier. You should have caught that one,'' meaning the pass on the previous play. And they both laughed.
Now that he's relived it a few hundred times, Roethlisberger wouldn't change a thing. Obviously. "I was just trying to make a play,'' he said. "Nothing complicated. Looking back on it, if I was a little timid, or if I thought about it, it's a different story. But you can't play football like that. It's a game of reaction. I play the game one way. You saw it on that drive.''