On behalf of the City of Pittsburgh, Steelers Nation — heck, maybe even the United Nations — I say we owe Landry Jones an apology.

We gave Jones no chance to beat the New England Patriots. None. Oddsmakers even had the Steelers as seven-point underdogs — at Heinz Field.

Jones didn't just surprise us with his play in place of Ben Roethlisberger. It's fair to say that the backup quarterback exceeded all expectations.

Still, that didn't stop the Patriots from taking advantage of Jones' mistakes to beat the Steelers, 27-16, on Sunday to take control of the AFC playoff race.

“I thought he did some good things,” Steelers coach Mike Tomlin said of Jones. who completed 29 of 47 passes for 281 yards, with a touchdown and an interception in the end zone.

“The red-zone interception was unfortunate, but it wasn't going to be about Landry Jones' play for us. It was going to be about the challenge that was presented to us in the manner in which we needed to play collectively in an effort to overcome that challenge.Largely, we were unsuccessful.”

For that, his Steelers teammates should be sorry.

They knew Jones wasn't going to be Big Ben, but their timing was off. They didn't do enough to make up for Roethlisberger's absence or Jones' inexperience.

“We made plays for him at times,” receiver Darrius Heyward-Bey said. “We've got to make more plays for him.”

The Steelers complimented Jones for showing confidence, for making plays under pressure.

“I think he didn't get the full support from the rest of the offense as a group,” said left tackle Alejandro Villanueva, who was called for a false start penalty. “And he definitely did his job. Obviously, he made some mistakes. He'll learn from them. But I think, as an offense, we could have done a lot more to help him out.”

Jones started slow, going three-and-out on his first offensive possession and then throwing that end-zone pick. Jones called it a “bad ball,” an underthrown pass intended for Antonio Brown that Patriots cornerback Malcolm Butler picked off.

“AB ran a good route,” Jones said. “I threw a crappy ball.”

The Steelers looked lost when the Patriots took a 14-0 lead by 10:58 of the second quarter. That's when Jones got going, completing a 51-yard pass to Brown and a 14-yard touchdown to Heyward-Bey.

The Steelers could have tied it when Jones hit Heyward-Bey for another 14-yard scoring pass. Instead, it was negated by right tackle Chris Hubbard's holding penalty, and Chris Boswell missed a 42-yard field goal.

“We realized that our margin for error was minimal,” Tomlin said. “We left some red-zone possessions out there. Offensively, we threw an interception when we were down there. We missed a field goal. You can't do that versus good people.”

Especially not New England.

The Patriots aren't just the best team in the AFC, they have perhaps the best quarterback in NFL history in Tom Brady.

Brady completed his first nine pass attempts and gave the Patriots a 14-0 lead, putting Jones in a two-touchdown hole.

Where the Steelers went 1 for 4 in the red zone, the Patriots went 3 for 3. That was the difference in this game, plain and simple.

“To be honest with you, we moved the ball up and down the field,” Jones said. “That was no issue. The issue was in the red zone. We kicked field goals instead of scoring touchdowns.”

In other words, the Steelers played it safe against the Patriots. And the Patriots responded in kind, switching from a man defense to a zone and playing to protect the sticks.

The Steelers didn't ask Jones to win them the game. They simply asked him to get the ball to their stars. And he did that, finding Brown seven times for 106 yards and getting it to Le'Veon Bell 31 times for 149 yards total offense.

“I thought he did a great job,'' Brown said. “We rallied behind him.”

Problem was, Jones followed a fine first half (14 of 20 for 179 yards) with an erratic second half, including three failed third-down passes inside the 36.

Jones missed tight end Xavier Grimble on a third-and-4 at the 28, and the Steelers settled for a Boswell 46-yard field goal. Jones missed Brown on a third-and-10 at the 26, forcing a 44-yarder by Boswell. When Jones missed Bell on a third-and-3 at the 36, Boswell's 54-yard attempt sailed wide right.

For those failures, Jones pointed the finger at himself.

“So, everyone had a hand in it,” he said. “We have got to solve this red-zone issue for us to be the offense that we want to be.”

Or, at least, the offense that can win the Steelers games until Roethlisberger returns. Jones hasn't proven he can do that, but did show that he can't do it alone.

“I think he played a good game,” Bell said. “Obviously, he made a couple mistakes here and there, but that's normal. I don't think it was all his fault, I don't think it was all the defense's fault or whatever. It was a collective (effort), and we didn't get the job done.”

The Steelers weren't as sorry as we expected them to be with Jones at quarterback. But they do owe him an apology.

Kevin Gorman is a Tribune-Review staff writer. Reach him at kgorman@tribweb.com or via Twitter @KGorman_Trib.

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