Instant Thoughts - Steelers vs. Redskins

Here's the post-game e-mail exchange between David and Mario after this weekend's third preseason game, in which the Steelers improved to 2-1 by defeating the Washington Redskins:

From David to Mario:
The defense has to get off the field on third down. Washington isn't exactly Indianapolis or Cincinnati. In fact they might be the only team with a shorter average receiver height than us. I think the Steelers fall in love with the blitz a little much. We almost never have coverage sacks and while its nice to see guys running free at the quarterback, Campbell was finding the open receiver easily, even Todd Collins wasn't fooled. If you come off of a receiver to blitz, you have to have someone cover that receiver. Wasn't that the point of the zone blitz?

The offense didn't look great either. It definitely felt like a small step back, but it is just preseason.

Santonio Holmes looked good again. I think he may have won the starting job with some of those catches.

Brett Keisel pulled out his inner Kimo putting Jason Campbell down. It almost became unsafe for him to visit our nation's capital.

I don't know if you watched it on NFL Network, but Joe Theismann was doing local color for the Redskins the first half. Oh how the mighty have fallen. He was unsurprisingly awful and his reaction to the Kiesel hit was vintage Theismann. He kept talking about how Kiesel should have pulled up (he was falling down), how a 15 yard penalty wasn't enough, going on and on, and then when asked if the hit was dirty went immediately to "no, it wasn't a dirty or intentional play". If you think he could of pulled up and didn't Joe, how is that not dirty?

It wasn't dirty anyway - Kiesel literally fell into his Campbell's knee.

Did I tell you the Pro-Football Prospectus is the greatest book ever?

From Mario to David:

Ummm, first of all, it became unsafe to visit our nation's capital a long time ago. Have you seen the murder rate there lately??

I know I sent you a message about this while listening to the radio broadcast of the game, but the main thing to focus on, as you said, was third down. Both first team offenses were equally (un)productive on first and second downs, but the third downs were what killed the Steelers. Actually, it seemed like more of Pittsburgh's third downs were of the 3rd and 3 or 3rd and 4 variety, while Washington was picking up 3rd and 9 or 3rd and 12 against the vaunted Steeler D.

And yeah, it was a little discouraging when Kiesel knocked out Campbell yet Todd Collins came in and sliced up the defense for the remaining 30 or so yards to get into the end zone.

Kiesel's hit wasn't dirty. I'm okay with the penalty, because that's the Kimo Rule that they put in after the 2005 playoffs - don't come in low at the QB. That's fine, make the call. But just don't say it was dirty. Classy move by Kiesel to go over and say something to Campbell as he was being carted off, though.

From David to Mario:
Yeah, it was tough to judge the receivers, because the offense didn't seem to be clicking. I did not watch the 4th quarter but St. Pierre is making a case for a roster spot. Do you think we hold three qbs this year? Most teams do, don't they? The Steelers always had Randlel-El as the third, who was listed last year?

Kiesel the Diesel isn't scared of some punks in DC.

The secondary looked bad. In man coverage guys were just not covering the players. In zone, the holes were huge. Maybe I did overestimate the Packers.

Sepulvda looked good though, he kicks the shit out of the ball.

From David to Mario:

This is funny, I was reading Peter King’s MMQB after I sent you that e-mail and he says "n. Special Teams Player of the Preseason: Pittsburgh punter Daniel Sepulveda. In his last two games, he's punted nine times for a 49.9-average ... and he's had only 15 return yards on those nine punts. The kid's a 6-foot-3 monster, and he could be quite a weapon."

I should have my own column on SI, but he really does look awesome, doesn't he? I'm just disappointed he hasn't come down and laid out a returner yet. It has to happen soon, right?

From Mario to David:

No, you should not have your own column on SI. You misspell at least one word each e-mail, and your grammar is pretty bad sometimes.

From David to Mario:

Yeah, but they have editors, right? I could probably spend more time on it if it weren't for this damn job problem I have.

Barlow is gone. Haynes made a case. I think Kreider is gone just because he is too limited. He does one thing as well as anyone else in the league - great blocks at the hole. But he doesn't catch passes, I never see him on special teams. If they are planning to keep Carey Davis or Gary Russell and run out of more single back sets than I can't see how they keep Kreider. I hope he catches on somewhere else if he goes though. I like him. I think right now it is Willie, Haynes, and Russell/Davis with the other of those two on the practice squad.
So we don't have any sense of how Arians and Tomlin feel about keeping two or three quarterbacks?

Is Cedric Wilson going to be useless if Santonio wins the starting job?

By the way, Willie looked pretty average. I would probably avoid him in Fantasy Football. I think he is going to have a down year.

From Mario to David:

That's my problem with Kreider. He's too one-dimensional. He used to be on one of the kicking teams - maybe field goal/PAT? But I'm not even sure if he does that anymore. I think Russell may have an edge right now on Davis, because I think with Haynes' experience, he'd earn the edge over Davis as they're both bigger guys who could fill either a tailback or fullback role. And then hopefully Davis wouldn't get picked up so he could go on the Steelers' practice squad.

I have no clue about the staff's feeling of how many QBs to keep. Obviously Arians has been around the past few years to see it done both ways with the Steelers, but when the third QB was Tommy Maddox, that didn't exactly entice him, I'm sure.

Cedric can make plays, too. I think he'll be a weapon. I think when they go to four wideouts its going to be tough to defend, because in addition to Willie Parker in the backfield as a breakaway threat, Cedric and Santonio, along with Nate Washington (if he catches it) are all deep threat guys while Hines will catch anything underneath.

I would possibly believe you about Willie if you weren't picking directly AFTER me in our fantasy league and you weren't salivating about the prospect of getting your favorite player in the league. Too bad. I'm taking him.

From David to Mario:

I don't know, he's looking iffy. I wouldn't take him until the third round.

My point on Cedric is will he become a problem with attitude if he gets bumped to third for Santonio. I love Cedric's talent, but I just hate his attitude.

From Mario to David:

Maybe if Mike Tomlin lets Cedric take a few snaps at quarterback, then he'll be happy. I'm still pushing for him to be the punt returner, too. He's been as consistent as anyone back there, which still doesn't say much, though its true. It just seems like they're pushing Willie Reid for the job so they can validate his third round selection last year since he missed practically the entire season, but if he's struggling on returns and not distinguishing himself at receiver, then what value does he have to the team?

And I'm assuming that even if Cedric starts to bitch about not getting enough touches, that will be drowned out by the cheers for Santonio if he keeps playing the way he has thus far in the preseason. I'm predicting 1,100 yards for Holmes this year, to lead the team. He won't have more catches than Hines Ward, who will probably put up his typical 70-80 or so catches for 978 yards, but his gamebreaking ability will make him stand out. Just remember how last season ended in overtime against the Bengals.

Preseason Game No. 2 - Steelers vs. Packers Recap

The Black and Gold made their first appearance of the 2007 season at Heinz Field on Saturday night for a game against the Green Bay Packers. Both teams' starters struggled a bit, though the Steelers second team got out to a 9-0 lead before the Packers rallied in the second half for a 13-9 victory.

The game was blacked out in my area but replays are being shown multiple times this week on the NFL Network (see previous post). However, I was able to listen to Bill Hillgrove and Tunch Ilkin's radio broadcast for most of the game, and here are my thoughts:

The no-huddle offense that Bruce Arians had Ben Roethlisberger and the first team offense come out with is tough to exhibit in a preseason game. First of all, Arians is obviously going to want to hide a lot of the wrinkles the team has been working on in order to save them for the regular season. Secondly, the no-huddle is very dependent on a quarterback being in rhythm, and that's tough to ask that of Ben on the very first series of the game. And thirdly, and most importantly in my mind, the no-huddle is much more effective to use against a defense that is worn down at a later point in the game. Its not as if the Packers were gasping for air after three plays. I'm excited to see how the Steelers utilize the new package this year, but for this game, it didn't work.

Charlie Batch looked very good again. He's proving (if he hasn't already proved it) that he is one of the most dependable and serviceable backup signal callers in the league. Batch was 3 of 5 for 97 yards and a touchdown, with the score being on a 41-yard pass to Walter Young. Brian St. Pierre came in for the second half and was 10 of 23 for 99 yards in mostly ineffective play.

The offensive line is definitely a concern. For as good as the line looked last week in roughing up the Saints' defensive front, the opposite happened this weekend. The Disgruntled Alan Faneca was out, and that obviously hurt, but the Steelers gave up three sacks from the left tackle position, where Max Starks got some playing time in a tryout role as opposed to his normal right tackle spot.

The guy who was the darling of Steeler Nation last week, RB Carey Davis, didn't get the ball this week, though he did make some nice special teams plays. However, undrafted rookie Gary Russell looked good once again. After rushing for 41 yards on eight carries against New Orleans, Russell led the Steelers with 56 yards on nine attempts against the Packers. Najeh Davenport started once again in place of Willie Parker and had 34 yards on seven carries, though 21 of those yards came on one run. Kevan Barlow had 25 yards on six carries, including a 17-yard burst.

As for the receivers, Walter Young is trying his best to stay off of the practice squad this year. Young had two catches for 50 yards including that touchdown. Santonio Holmes continued to look like he's in for a big year, with a 49-yard catch and run. Nate Washington didn't even drop a pass!

The special teams play had its ups and downs. Daniel Sepulveda boomed five punts for an average of 49.8 yards, including a 59-yarder in the second quarter that went out of bounds inside the 20-yard line. Cedric Wilson staked his claim to be the punt returner with two runbacks for an average of 19 yards. However, Jeff Reed had a PAT blocked.

Defensively there were no individual standout performances, though rookie William Gay had another solid game, including recording the Steelers' only sack. Pittsburgh held Brett Favre to 2 of 7 passing for 7 yards. So for those keeping track at home, Favre and Drew Brees have combined to go 3 of 13 for 13 yards against the first-team D. Not too shabby. Up next for the Steelers is the third game of the preseason, Saturday at 8 p.m. at Washington.

Quick Hit Thoughts From the HOF Game

The Hall of Fame game is in the books and football season has officially started. The Pittsburgh Steelers rolled the New Orleans Saints. The first preseason game means next to nothing but it was nice to see the players hitting hard and executing well so early in the season.

Here are some quick thoughts from the game.

Hopefully Cedric is happy now. He got most of the looks when he was in the game and did well with them. He's needs to stop complaining and recognize that this is a team where you sacrifice stats for wins. He is becoming a short Plaxico Burress in his attitude, it will be interesting to see how long Tomlin and Hines Ward are going to put up with that.

Woodley looked solid in his time in the game, breaking up a pass by diving in front of the receiver.

The overall defense looked strong and looked like a Dick LeBeau defense.

Nate Washington needs to learn how to catch if he is ever going to make an impact on this team.

Great to see all the coverage problems have been fixed. The refs saved Reid on that fumble. The Steelers have to do better in that respect.

Carey Davis looked very solid. It will be interesting to see if he can keep the pace up. He was more impressive than Najeh or Barlow.

St. Pierre's fade to Santonio was beautiful. As was Ben's deep toss to Cedric.

Hey Robert Meachem, welcome to the NFL, a guy named Gay laid your ass out.