RUSH: Here’s Ray in Salt Lake City, Utah, on Open Line Friday. How are you doing, Ray? Great to have you with us.

CALLER: Great. Thank you. Merry Christmas greetings to you, Rush. First-time caller. Second generation listener.

RUSH: Great to have you!

CALLER: Over here in Salt Lake City today and just wanted to get your take on the NFL. I know you’re Pittsburgh Steelers fan and so am I. I’m actually second generation on that. My dad was a Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, resident. So I grew up loving the Pittsburgh. (sic) I have more faith in them. But right now, we’re up against the Ravens next, and just wanted to see what your take was with them getting into the playoffs and just carrying on without JuJu.

RUSH: They’re just gonna miss JuJu Smith-Schuster No. 19 for one game.

CALLER: Yeah.

RUSH: Ryan Shazier is out for the season, no doubt, and he was important. He’s the best tackler on the field and he’s the middle linebacker, captain of the team. Defense especially. What I’ve noticed about the Steelers — and I have to be honest, Ray: I haven’t watched as many games this year since the kneeling protests began. It made me sad. But the Steelers are my team. What I’ve noticed about ’em is they play to the level of their competition and frustrate the hell out of me. I mean, they should have rolled through Green Bay and it took a last-minute field goal.

Ditto the Bears. They lost to the Bears, one of the first/early games. And Cincinnati? They really should have rolled over Cincinnati. It shouldn’t have taken a last-minute field goal there either. Now they got the Ravens coming to town. The Ravens are not lighting it up on offense. Their offense is starting to come back. They’ll rise to the occasion. The game everybody is looking forward to is a week from Sunday, New England in Pittsburgh. That’s where Steelers fans still lack the confidence that the Steelers secondary can hold up against Tom Brady, and I don’t know about that.