Big Lead Sports Bar

12/10/2009

THE WHEELS HAVE OFFICIALLY COME OFF

No sense in making anyone wait for a recap post in order to vent their frustrations.
Let them have it. Recap forthcoming.

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39 comments:

The Taxidermist said...

Way to go Tomlin! Way to "shake things up"! I'm sorta glad we lost this way our group of coaches get exposed as the frauds they are. Better figure out what our draft strategy is gonna be. Better yet, lose the rest of the games so we get a better draft pic!

Koz said...

Where does this team rank among other defending champ busts in pro sports?

Given most of the same personnel is there, this is really stunning. I know the SB XL defenders also missed the playoffs, but the types of losses and the fashion in which this team has collapsed is EPIC.

Looking at the schedule, it seems quite possible they could actually lose the rest of the way. At least that would mean better draft position.

What a bummer.

okel dokel said...

Epic Fail! Marcia Brady was 6 - 19 for 90 yards. We gave up 8 sacks and that plus the usual speacil teams gaffe loses the game.

This team really lacks heart and Tomlin has lost them. You better get it figured out there Mike because this rests solely on your shoulders.

okel dokel said...

BTW this should be be in the top 15 for painful losses. This may mark the end of an era.

MJ said...

Look at all the games they won last year. They squeaked out on six of them. Browns 10-6 ... Ravens 23-20 ... Jags 26-21 ... Chargers 11-10 ... Cowboys 20-13 ... Ravens 13-9.

Turn those results around you have the same washed-up 6-10 we have this year. Same team as last year, slightly different results. Much different record.

And who can actually be angry after they lost to the Raiders last week. Tonight's loss shouldn't come as a surprise.

nuthinhere said...

I think the Steelers started the offseason a few weeks ago. There playing like it anyway.

Unknown said...

It's unbelievable. I would have bet my house after the Denver game that the Steelers wouldn't lose 5 straight (6 after next Sunday). I don't want to throw Tomlin under the bus just yet, but Cowher NEVER had a team quit on him the way these guys quit on Tomlin. Even when the Steelers had losing seasons, the team would play til week 17.

The Taxidermist said...

Well I'd much rather lose a game to the Raiders than lose to the Browns. Browns are worse than the Raiders. Does that make the Steelers the worst team in the NFL now?

Vince said...

The most annoying part was watching Brady Quinn celebrating after the game... He is seriously one of the worst starting QBs in the entire NFL right now...

rob said...

that was a complete joke.

with the season all but over, i won't vent my frustrations about this particular game, rather the season in its entirety.

offense
- ben threw picks at incredibly inopportune times: in the red zone (in the end zone even) and multiple pick 6's.

while the defense ultimately gave up the leads in these games, our offense did their best to make it as hard as possible for them to hold the lead.

- play calling

early on in the season, with a substantial lead in the second half, rather than run the ball to eat clock time, we aired it out. sometimes three plays in a row. we'd ultimately end up punting the ball, with our defense left to endure the bulk of the second half.

whether this was ben's or arians' doing is not the concern. the concern is that this method does not shut out football games.

i understand we're a pass-first team now - and i'm okay with that. but it's ludicrous to me to see us attempt three straight passes, up by 10, in the second half, with our running back average 5 ypc in the first half.


defense

- the injuries did not play as big a role as people think. losing a. smith and troy is detrimental, but it does not cause five straight losses.

- db coverage

the cornerbacks cannot cover whosoever. the safeties do not help the cornerbacks' blown coverage at all.

- defensive discipline

the entire defensive backfield tries to knock the receiver's head off rather than tackle. this is a massive concern as i think is the responsibility of the coach to control his insubordinate, thug players. and i'm not talking about lebeau.

the defensive backfield committed a number of personal foul penalties that continued teams' drives.

- missed opportunities

the defensive backs cannot intercept a pass to save their lives. whether they miss out on a pick due to the "sportscenter hit" attempt or the ball bounces off their chest, there's no excuse to drop all of those balls. if we caught half of the interceptions we dropped, we would have won at least two more games.

special teams

- i don't believe i need to touch upon this subject. however, the lack of discipline and poor tackling lies with the head coach.

coaching

i give tomlin an enormous amount of credit for winning the super bowl last year. i like him a lot and i think he's a good coach. however, there's a difference between losing a football game and losing the way WE lose football games.

i don't feel tomlin has control over this team at all. he handled almost every off-the-field issue incorrectly this year (jeff reed, ben's concussion, etc.). and the fact there were so many off-the-field issues is a tell tale sign that the players do what they want.

i think the majority of our flaws this season start from the coach and trickle down. while i'm a traditionalist and would like to see tomlin coach the team for another 30 years, i would not be surprised if next season goes similarly, we let him go.

nothing this season was representative of what we expect from steelers football.

i'm also not buying tomlin's cocky, bullshit rhetoric he delivers at the end of each game / press conference. if you're going to act in such a bombastic manner, you better deliver.

(also, for the record, i don't think lebeau is to blame for any of the defensive mishaps this season.)

Chip said...

MJ: Thank you for pointing out what I've been trying to say all season. Last year wasn't as great as the Yinzer Nation wants to make it out to be. Our offense was still this pass happy SUCKFEST run by a mush brained QB who is only good as a game manager but Arians expects him to be Peyton Manning.

We just played airtight defense and were lucky enough to pull out a bunch of games late. Well, live by the sword, die by the sword.

The offense is a fraud that depends on the pass too much. The defense is a old and can't make plays without Polamalu. And Tomlin is clueless. He took Bill Cowher's team to a Super Bowl and now he's lost on his own.

Welcome to John Gruden 2.0. We're not going to make the playoffs until this entire coaching staff, especially Omar Epps, is gone. They're idiots.

Koz said...

@Chip

So all the winning was luck? Where were you with this call last year?

Scott Zigarovich said...

December 10, 2009.......The worst day of my life.

..............Somebody get me a Tennessee hostess

MJ said...

Whoa, Chip. We won the Super Bowl. That is the definition of a good year. All I was saying is that there is a fine line between winning and losing (to quote Yinzer Nation's favorite coach).

And Bill... Were you around for the 1999 season? That team quit hardcore.

Chip said...

We won the Super Bowl but we won last year in an unsustainable fashion. You can't play sucky offense for 3 and 1/2 quarters every game (which they did last year and continued doing this year) and then expect the D to get a Pick 6 or a big stop so Ben can lead the game winning drive. It's not a winning formula. It's a wing and a prayer.

Winning the Super Bowl was in some ways the worst thing that could happen because it convinced the "see no evil" yinzers that everything we did last year worked because, HEY WE WON! That's moronic thinking.

All last year proved was that if by some miracle everybody on D stayed healthy AND had career years AND Dick Lebeau was left to do what he wanted, they could cover for all the mistakes on offense and lack of leadership by Mike Tomlin. If you think that's a "plan" for a championship team, you need to put your Terrible Towel jammies away and wake up.

This team lucked out last year (and I repeatedly pointed out the offense sucked last year, as I've done all this season) and now that Tomlin can't ride Cowher's coattails anymore, it's only going to get worse. I predict 5-11 next season.

SantoGold said...

Chip probably ragged on the '85 Bears defense for giving up 38 points to Marino and the Dolphins; Proof that they were overrated and got exposed.

There was really only 1 player in the Browns offense who could hurt you and that would be Cribbs. So you focus on him and let Brady Quinn or someone else make the plays to beat you. But that didn't happen.

You're playing against the worst defense in the league and we make their DB's look like Blount and Woodson. Our WRs would run right at their secondary and then make no effort to improvise and try to get open.

I hate to use the word "quitters" because all of these guys are pro's and these are the Steelers dammit, but that sure looked like what happened tonight.

Louis Lipps is my homeboy said...

Bright side: ESPN called out the offense saying that schematics lead to a lot of those sacks.

Who schemes things? Arians. Please, oh PLEEEEEEASE tell me he's gone after this year.

Tomlin, love the job you did your first two years, but right now you're letting it get away from you buddy. For as well as you handled a very trying season last year, you're mishandling this season. If this team does not stay together for these last 3 games, it also looks bad for next year and in turn YOU.

This team's not together. Somewhere along the way, they lost their confidence. Losing breeds losing.

Probably the worst defense of a Super Bowl ever.

And it's not like Cleveland was getting ANYTHING at all from their QB position. Even the couple of big passes Quinn did complete were because of great catches by his receivers. Yet still, we couldn't muster enough points to beat what essentially the Cleveland defense and Josh Cribbs??? Sad.

Koz said...

How long has Mike Furrey #87, been playing defensive back for Cleveland?
How does that not get exploited?

I was watching both Pens & Steelers, so they might have explained his presence in the broadcast, but I missed it.

MJ said...

Do you think ESPN will fire Trent Dilfer after he predicted on Wednesday that the Steelers were going to make the playoffs? If he had done his job and watched about three minutes of game footage from the previous four games, he might have felt differently.

Someone Somewhere said...

Hey Chip...everyone's a freaking genius in hindsight. Oh, and since when is winning a super bowl "the worst thing that could happen"?? Are you serious? Why don't you go ask some Buffalo Bills or Minnesota Vikings fans about winning a single Super Bowl in "unsustainable" fashion? Are we really that jaded that we are quantifying the relative quality of a championship that has been won 43 times by only 17 teams? Sure this sucks ass, sure the team looks like complete garbage...but it's not the end of the world. Go throw on some Super Bowl 43 highlights or watch the replay of the 2002 AFC Wild Card against the Browns on NFL network tomorrow night. The Steelers still have 6 Lombardi's...they aren't going to win it every year.

Louis Lipps is my homeboy said...

Doesn't winning a Super Bowl with an aging team and a "mush brained QB" constitute a good coaching job?

Chip, your thoughts on last year's Super Bowl run are idiotic. We won the Super Bowl. Sure we all hated Arians, but I thought Tomlin did a great job DESPITE of Bruce last year. And not many fans liked Arians last year. You act like the guy was Mr Popularity amongst Steeler fans.

I love the guy who comes out of the woodwork when something goes wrong to bash generally everyone involved in a prominent role with the team, and then implies that none of us other chuckleheads see what he sees because we're just stupid "yinzers" who are obviously of lesser intelligence than he. Check message boards after a Pittsburgh loss in any sport and you WILL find this guy.

So if the Pens lose in the playoffs, were we all just stupid yinzers for actually thinking that Sidney Crosby was a good hockey player, when he's really an overrated bum? You condescending assholes kill me.

After this season: old blood will be cleared out on defense (bye Farrior), Arians should finally be gone (the one benefit to a losing season), and then we'll see what happens.

BTW, Hines gutting it out probably had a lot to do with the lack of open receivers to throw to. It's not like these two 1,000 yard receivers we had just all the sudden started sucking 3/4 of the way through the year out of the blue.

Jeff_King_Fan said...

just got home from the game. very disappointed. it was my girlfriends first NFL game. the below temp didnt help either...


with the 10th pick in the 2010 NFL Draft the Pittsburgh Steelers select Steve Addazio, offensive coordinator out of Florida.

Someone Somewhere said...

Eh, Steve Addazio couldn't even drum up a game plan to keep the SEC Championship close with the 'greatest human being ever'...Pittsburgh can do better than that.

Adam said...

Hey guys, it's ok. 115 days till Spring Trainging with Iwamura, Crosby, and Traynor in tow.

Scott Zigarovich said...

@Adam

I think we have a situation there

Unknown said...

Seriously some of these comments are absolutely ridiculous. We won't realize what's wrong until Tomlin's gone? Seriously? I guess we also should have bailed on Cowher before he drafted Ben. Couldn't win the big game, and never will right? Are you all actually that retarded? Teams have up and down year, yes we won a lot of close games last year on route to the super bowl, but guess what we have lost just as many close games this year. Why is it that only when every loss by less than 10 happens people start calling for heads. Jesus christ this is stupid. Teams have ups and downs, the playoffs every year is not something that is going to happen, can't we just chalk it up to a tough year of bad breaks and injuries? Nope, Tomlin sucks, Ben's no better than a game manager, TRADE EVERYONE!!!!. How about we all calm the hell down, add a top 15 pick to a very similar team that won the Super Bowl, and see what happens? Never mind, lets just burn down the damn field and fire everyone.

Collin said...

It seems like most talk about Tomlin is the same over-reaction as after they won the Super Bowl, except in the opposite direction.

After SB43 there was a lot of talk about what a great coach Tomlin was and how the Steelers had made another great higher. And to a lesser extent how Cowher may not have won the Super Bowl with that team.

Now that the shits hit the fan this year its talk about what a terrible coach Tomlin is and how Cowher would have done better with this team.

My take on it is that Tomlin is an inexperienced coach. Not just because its his 3rd season as a head coach but because he only had 1 season as a coordinator before that. That's just not much time in a major role in the NFL. We knew this when he was hired and knew there would be growing pains. And it's really showing this year. To put it blatantly, he's screwed up this year. He has made mistakes and has handled this year pretty poorly. His handling of the team may be a big reason why this team is in a free fall right now.

This doesn't make him a bad coach any more than winning the Super Bowl made him a great coach. What will define his abilities as a coach is how he does the next couple of years. Lets give him a chance to look back on this year, figure out what he fucked up, and grow from it and make changes. Then we'll know what type of a coach we have. One bad year from a young, inexperienced coach just doesn't seem like enough to make a fair judgement.

Steve said...

Yup, a 15th pick will fix what ails this team, because we all know how rookies can turn team fortunes around on a dime. Even Troy didn't make an impact immediately, so unless we're drafting a QB, you can think again.

There are too many things this team needs to correct to say they can turn it around in one year.

The O-line needs upgraded and Colon needs to go. On many of Ben's sacks last nite he was caught standing there flat footed like a big dumb speed bump.

Taylor need to go. The pass reception in the 1st half against him was as brutal a conviction of his abilites at corner as ever there was.

Farrior has to go. Quite simply, he's old, small and tackles like a girl anymore. I could care less about what kind of suppossed leadership he carries out there because I saw none of it last nite and none of it this season.

A historical season ending implosion like this won't go unnoticed by the owners and management either, so heads will have to roll. you just can't come out with the same coaching next season after this epic bed-$hitting. Ligashesky will be fired, either Arians, LeBeau, or both will be canned and the clock on Tomlin will be officially moved 1-hour ahead.

I know, I know, the Steelers have this history of keeping coaches forever and sometimes too long but this season is different. No other coach has suffered this kind of absolute failure after winning a Super Bowl. The 2006 season looks like a champpionship one compared to this. No other supossedly good team has lost to the likes the Steelers have lost to this season and in the fashion they have. No one is thinking; hey this is a good team, they just had a few bad bounces. This is not a good team...this team is the worst in fooball right now and only a loss to Detroit (which they came very close to) would make it official.

Unknown said...

how about getting sacked by the cleveland browns while they were in prevent?

The Abiding Dude said...

I love it...yinzers calling for Tomlin and the nature of people hating on Ben. Down years happen, whaddya people want? Some franchises would kill to be in the position this franchise has been for the past 2 decades. We are spoiled sports fans, but don't act like yinzers people...

Pens won? That is a good thing....

bohica said...

I hate BA as much as the next guy but the guy isn't going anywhere because Ben LOVES him. Why, I will never know. No four minute offense whatsoever.

Farrior is done, and it seems that Woodley is not the player he is without Aaron Smith lining up next to him. That is a compliment to Smitty, not a shot at Wood.

William Gay is horrible. He was a seventh rounder for a reason.

I am basically spitting out the same gripes as everyone else, I just wanted to vent. Good day.

Unknown said...

I agree with the views of MJ, Louis Lipps, and Collin.

Last year we won a lot of games at the last minute, and now we've been on the other end of it, although against lesser teams (KC, Oak, Chi). It sucks.

Regardless, we had no business losing to Oakland in the first place. Our secondary can't catch or cover.

Bottom line is we aren't playing good football in any aspect of the game - offense, defense, and oh yeah, special teams. They aren't independent of each other since our special teams typically gives our D horrendous field position.

Regarding last night's loss, as stated before, our WR's made Cleveland's secondary look Pro-Bowl caliber. How can 2 Super Bowl MVP's get absolutely no separation?? Most of the sacks were coverage related.

The losses to our D caused huge problems. Not just due to injury but guys we lost in the offseason like McFadden and even Foote.

I have faith in Tomlin, he's a young guy, this is the first real roadbump he's hit. I have confidence in him that he'll learn from this year's mistakes and fix the shit.

And for the love of God, don't rush anyone from injury back, not for this season, save Troy for 2010.

Another bonus of this season: no way we're going to get a player on the cover of Madden, so that should keep one guy off the IR.

Unknown said...

I blame the appearance on RAW...

(NOTE: I don't actually blame the appearance on RAW)

getfreshdesigns said...

Since I started following the Steelers in 1987. I have seen 5 losing seasons. 9 seasons with no playoffs with 4 of those coming at the tail end of the Chuck Noll era. And 3 Super Bowl appearances with 2 SB wins
(this season not included since it's not technically done yet)

Point. As a Steelers fan, I'm spoiled this team has been extremely successful, and a bad year happens. Oh well.

Just like the Bungles having a good season once every 10 years, the Steelers will have a bad season.

Anonymous said...

This loss sucks, but let's not call for Tomlin's head yet...Bruce Arians' maybe, but not Tomlin's.

Plus, it's the nature of the NFL. You can go from 10-6 to 6-10 like that. Even this years Saints are only a couple of FGs and a couple of pick sixes away from a much less respectable 8-5.

Anyway, I think one of the defining characteristics of the Steelers is their ability to not panick after bad seasons or rough patches. It is what keeps them competitive most years. Do they need to make changes? Of course. Do they need to clean house? Absolutely not. The Steelers ability to make level-headed football decisions and stick with a good core even during turmoil is what sets them apart from, say, the Cowboys. Let's keep it that way.

Unknown said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Someone Somewhere said...

I still think it's interesting to see everyone and their mother out calling for the head of Bruce Arians...but the words "Dick" and "LeBeau" receive nary a mention in the same light. No, instead "the players are old", "the corners stink", "the loss of Smith, Troy and the offseason departures has hampered the defense". Maybe all of us fans are offensive geniuses, and can easily recognize that Arians is inept as a playcaller, while LeBeau has struggled to scheme in light of the loss of two of his best players. The offense has too much talent to only score 6 points against Cleveland...clearly Arians is at fault for not making adjustments or installing a better gameplan. Wouldn't that put Dick LeBeau at fault for not making adjustments in the 4th quarter and allowing (one of) the worst offense(s) in football march up and down the field for 3 touchdowns in the 4th quarter? Yet, everyone wants Arians' head, and LeBeau receives what equates to a free pass...all year. If the Cleve Browns can sack Roethlisberger 8 times with the worst defense in the league minus FIVE starters (!), how can the great Dick Lebeau not coach up a unit that was considered one of the best EVER last year?

For what it's worth, I'm just playing devil's advocate here, I love Dick LeBeau, I think he's a great coordinator. I just think it's interesting that everyone knows how to fix the offense...but it's the defense that has been the biggest liability in the most crucial moments of this season. Teams that create turnovers usually win, Dick LeBeau defenses usually create turnovers, but that hasn't been happening this year.

Unknown said...

Sky is falling!!!

YinzerInExile said...

Two observations from an athlete who is decidedly not a football supergenius:

1. An accurate epithet that would have been hurled with abandon by my father, at me, in the even that I performed in a 09 Stillers-like fashion: cocky. Since you've all done such a smashing job of trying to breakdown the specific failures, I"ll just say that it certainly seems as though the whole team played in accordance with how they thought they should have to play against a team of X caliber. So we get decent games against "worthy" competitors like the Vikes and Ratbirds, and absolute crap against KC, Oakland and the Brownies because, "Hey, we're the defenders. We've so got this and whatever." The most disconcerting thing about this is that the KC loss didn't wake them back up.

I knows that's gross generalization, and that there haven't really been any clean games this season, just noting the decidedly ungroovy aura that seems to be surrounding this merry band of quitters of late.

2. Ok, all the chicken little shit: really? Someone on the intarwebz once pointed out that Steelers fans were so reviled because we are not simply happy with being freaking good, we have to be the best in every conceivable category. The team has to be swell, and comprised only of exceptional specimens of humanity who save the most puppies and love kids the best and support the most charities while leading us repeatedly to blowout victories against everyone, all the time. And when we don't get it -- say, in the form of a particularly lousy season -- we immediately start whining and bitching and moaning and calling for hangings, and we take to bridges and don black and get all emo on the rest of the league's fans, like they don't know what suffering is.

So this season has sucked. The esoteric "Steeler Way" is probably without a DNR, so it's not like we're never going to win again. Better we should focus our ire reasonably, expect some changes, expect some changes we might wish for to *not* be made, and just keep on keepin' on.

Because I saw some Brownies fans on TV last night who, judging by their mirth over a second victory this year, probably have a better grasp on football bereavement than does Steeler Nation. Just sayin'.