Loose Slag from The Still Mill           Jan. 10th, 2008

 

- The bitterest, saddest news upon the season ending, is that Tomlin has decided to retain Arians and LeBeau.   I have no idea why Tomlin felt a need to rabidly rush and make this proclamation.  He could have easily chewed on this a few more days. 

 

       When Tomlin took the job as a rookie had coach, he had little choice but to retain LeBeau and promote AirHead from WR Coach to OC.   It was already into February and top-caliber coaches had already been hired elsewhere.   And as a 34-year old rookie head coach, he really didn’t have the leverage to take a broom throughout the Steeler headquarters, nor did he have much pull around the NFL to attract top-shelf assistants. 

 

      Tommie has now completed a 10-6 season and won the AFC North.   He is no longer a rookie coach, and he now has leverage in his own organization and respect around the league.  Why, then, would he keep sad-sack Arians and the decrepit, senile LeBeau ?  Tomlin is no offensive guru; he needs a strong OC.  Clearly, Arians is not the OC for a head coach whose expertise is on the defensive side of the ball.  As for LeBeau, it’s quite obvious the entire league adjusted to his defense after mid-season, and he was too stupid, too stubborn, and too senile to adjust.   The shredding of this ’07 defense didn’t begin in the New England game; it began way back on Nov. 11th against the Browns.  The ’06 defense was nothing to be proud of, either.  At 70 years of age and fading fast, the "genius" tag for LeBeau has worn thinner than Kate Moss with access to the Fleet Enema Products factory.   If Tomlin is half the defensive expert that he supposedly is, he no longer needs LeBeau as a crutch to lean on. 

 

      Overall, I’m disappointed that Tomlin didn’t have the backbone, the vision, or the chutzpah to fire at least one of these underachieving slackards.  

 

- Equally stunning is that Spec Teams coach Bob Ligashitsky has not yet been fired.  Why not ?  All the extra time and detail supposedly poured in our STs this year, and for WHAT??  His coverage units performed like the dams and dikes in New Orleans, only more porous.  This imbecile has been an abject failure everywhere he's gone, and yet we picked him up faster than a staggering drunk bags the toothless middle-aged crackwhore at last call.  His utter incompetence was instrumental in every loss of the season, including this last one. He should be escorted out of the Burgh after being kicked in the balls till he bleeds from the ears.  But not by the punter he coached.....we need someone that can actually get the job done.

 

- I guess we should just throw in the towel for the ’08 season.  After all, Clark Haggans and his agent have proclaimed that Hagg, a UFA, will not be back with the Stillers.  Please, someone help me out here…..when was the last time in the ’07-08 season that Haggans made any sort of monstrous, game-breaking, stellar play ?  

 

- I’d railed in pregame “Keys to Beating the Jags” article about PASSING on running downs, as running the ball with backup RBs against the rugged front 7 of the Jags was futile.   Arians actually heeded this advise on the first drive, then shit the bed and chucked any rational common sense right out the window. 

 

       Of the 13 first-down runs, the offense gained a whopping grand total of 24 yards.  This was a classic case of banging one’s head against a brick wall, not because it made any sense to do so, but because of some asinine obligation to do it just for the sake of doing it. 

 

      The first 23 rushing attempts averaged a whopping 1.6 yards per carry.  The 24th carry gained 1 yard, on yet another exercise in futility because the situation was 3rd & 6 late in the 4Q. 

 

- I suppose we should be ecstatic that Arians, the dumbass that he is, didn’t try a line plunge on the 2-point attempt from the 12-yard line…..

 

- I’m about tired of hearing how “losing Aaron Smith killed the run defense…”   Bullshit! !   Look at the two (2) key runs in the Jax wildcard game -- the Drew 10-yard TD and the Garrard 32-yard keeper late in the game.  Both runs went right at the OTHER defensive end on the Steelers, Brett Keisel, who hadn’t made a play since November and whose play kept dropping as the season wore on.   What killed this run defense was the total absence of just one ILB that could actually play at the NFL level, along with the horrific decline in starting DE Brett Keisel and NT Casey Hampton. 

 

- Speaking of the infamous Han Solo, Casey Hampton, here’s a recap of how Jax blocked The Mighty King of Nose Tackles, aka “He ties up 2 blockers on just about every play”:

           Jax-1   Dec. 16

 

           Solo blocked:   33

            Solo with a small chip:  1

 

            Double teamed:   3

 

           Jax-2   Jan 5

 

            Solo blocked:   16

 

            Solo with a small chip:  3

 

            Double teamed:    2

 

             (Note: DVR problems prevented me from taping the very 1st plunge of the 3Q. ) 

 

   In other words, on 84% of designed ground plays spanning 2 games, Jax SOLO blocked Fat Casey Hampton.  Only 8% of the time did they double-team Han Solo Hampton.  The mythical fable has gone on long enough.  4 years ago, Hampton was a force that required frequent double-teaming.   This isn’t Strat-o-Mat, and you don’t get credit in current ballgames for what a player did years ago.  The fat lardass either needs to shed weight this offseason, or the team needs to stop devoting the enormous amount of salcap dollars, and playing time, to this over-rated fatass.  

 

- Down 18 points to Jax, I was 100% confident that we’d storm back and either tie or take the lead.  With the lead, late in the 4Q, I was 98% confident that we’d piss away this game with abject turtling and The Softee Defense. 

 

- Like I said, the only good thing from the Jax loss, is that Colbert and Khan can easily hand out DVD copies of the game to Roethlisberger’s agent when they sit down to renegotiate Ben’s contract.  Sure, Ben played admirably in the 2nd half…..after sucking elephant balls in the first half.  $10M per year QBs don’t barf it up and throw 3 INTs in the first half of a playoff game.  Colbert and Khan need to use this game -- playing it over and over on a plasma TV inside the conference room -- in order to chisel down Ben’s agent in the negotiations. 

 

- Not that the Hard Hat Award is a scientific tool, but it’s rather grim when you examine the list of Hard Hatters for this season.   The very nature of The Hard Hat Award lends itself to defensive players having an unfair advantage in the opportunity to win the award, yet only 3 defensive players -- Jamie Harrison, Aaron Smith, and Ty Carter -- took the honor this season.  That’s sad, and entirely indicative of how slothful, meek, and soft this defense was this season.  

 

- Speaking of meek and soft, has anyone seen Troy Polamlu lately….?

- You now have all the proof you need to show what a farce the Blow Bowl, and being named “All Pro”, are.  Crybaby Alan Faneca was named to both, despite playing the season at a performance level normally attributed to guards like Tom Myslinski and Brendan Stai.  

 

- I’d written this twice before in Slag articles, and it bears repeating --

 

   The biggest obstacle to this team making a deep playoff run?   It’s “# 1 ranked” defense.  The offense can move the ball and has enough playmakers to do some damage.  The spec teams are inconsistent and spotty, but can probably claw around just well enough to get by.  But The Softee Defense is just so soft n’ cheesy, that it’ll get carved apart and eaten alive by any above-mediocre playoff offense.  As I’ve been harping on since Browns-2 on Nov. 11th, here’s why this supposedly “#1 ranked defense” is such a fraud: 

 

           - Where are the game-changing plays?   You know, like the ones Carnell Lake and Rod Woodson used to make 4-5 times a season?

          

           - Where are the big plays, period ?  Where are the truly forced turnovers, aside from Jamie Harrison’s work ? 

 

           - Where are the punishing hits?   More importantly, where is the GANG tackling, where 3, 4, even 5 defenders are mauling and raking a ballcarrier? 

 

           - Where is the consistent heat and harassment on the QB?  I’m not talking about sacks.   I’m talking about in-yer-face heat and harassment, which has been totally non-existent for months.    

 

           - Where, and when, will the defense stop the bleeding on long, methodical marches by opposing offenses? 

 

           - Aside from the Seattle game, where is the imposition of dominance and physical punishment on an opposing offense?  

 

   It’s difficult to envision this defense suddenly cranking up the heat come playoff time.  

 

- I’ll be working on player grades, as well as coaches grades.  And, more importantly, I’ll also be working on the annual (or mostly annual, depending on when I feel like getting off my ass to compile it) Offseason Analysis, which takes a thorough, holistic look at the entire club and the strategic road ahead.   Stay tuned. 

(Still Mill and Stillers.com -- when it comes to the analysis of the Pittsburgh Stillers, no one else comes close….)