Not to jump in, but, I don't necessarily agree with your first point. Each player is significant, and there's some type of effect that travels down the roster when they're injured. When there's more injuries, that effect multiplies. I would argue that losing AJ, or any one of your multiple backups, is critical. You're saying its doesn't matter here because he didn't play. Well, he might've very well played had he not been consistently injured. And you can't predict what those results may have been.
Whereas with one player, he may be a great player, but the backup or backups have filled in just fine. Star player's worth gets blown out of proportion. Still a big loss in Pitt's case, no doubt, but not anything that derailed what they were trying to do.
Also, I've come to a point where you've gotta ask, how are we training our players? We've been snakebit so much over the years. I know that they studied this, but, it's been an abnormality for far too long, the unexpected is becoming the expected.
