But, clearly, there were a lot of issues. If we're going to lose to such a mediocre team, something must have gone awry. Well, the first place I'm looking is Bruce Arians. I am growing pretty weary of his pathetic play calling. Twice on 3rd and 10+'s, Arians called draws to Mewelde Moore. Now, I get it, you have a rookie QB and you don't want him doing anything stupid. But to win, the kid has to play well, and if you aren't going to give him the chance to succeed, you're taking points off the board. Also, Mewelde Moore should never have his number called. He should never ever, ever be the focus of the offense. The only time he should ever get touches like that is if we are up 21 points, and running the clock out late in the 4th quarter. Otherwise, he should be a safety valve and nothing else. Mendenhall does everything that Moore does. And yes, he may not be as consistent, but for Christ's sake, at least a draw to him has some chance of succeeding in that situation.
Arians' play calling has stopped making any sense whatsoever, and a change needs to be made.
I'm also more than a little concerned about the DBs. It had been suggested to me that maybe LeBeau was slipping a little bit - that his scheme was becoming haggard and that the rest of the league had figured things out. However, after watching Sunday's game, I'm convinced that it has nothing to do with LeBeau's scheme.
The trick is that Ike Taylor, William Gay and DeShea Townsend suck. Ike Taylor may be the fastest corner in the league, but it is clear that he is not playing with any kind of conviction out there. He just doesn't care, and as a result, he's getting beaten by lesser players who want it more. William Gay - I'm not sure that he isn't just a bad player. I'm not sure if he's lost confidence in himself or what, but teams have started exploiting him, and he seems powerless to stop it. Ryan Clark has been gashed for deep balls twice in as many weeks. It may be that he's overcompensating for the diminished range that the SS covers when you trade out Troy for Ty Carter, but he's been way out of position on both, and has let very, very average passing teams beat him at important times.
So, it isn't that LeBeau's scheme doesn't work. It's that the defensive backs aren't good enough to execute the scheme. If they give the front 7 any time at all, someone is getting to the QB. Harrison/Woodley/Timmons looked as good on Sunday as any time this year. But when the 9-yard out is open all game long because Ike Taylor and Will Gay aren't good enough to stop it, the pass rush isn't going to do a whole lot.
So, what does this mean for the rest of the season? Well, not much at all. The fact remains that the next two weeks, we have the Raiders at home and the Browns on the road. Now, we should have slaughtered the Chiefs, that's true. But wins in the next two weeks should still be expected. That leaves us at 8-5 going into a home rematch against Baltimore. And, frankly, you can understand Hines' frustration that Ben wasn't able to play (although this seems like it's all been blown out of proportion - it was Tomlin who said Ben couldn't play because the fucking team doctor wouldn't clear him... Shit, you gotta look big picture and recognize that your franchise and its $100 million investment need to last), because the team played relatively mistake-free football, and almost certainly wins with Ben at the helm.
Further, you have to expect that we'll be seeing Troy back in a few weeks. If he comes back healthy and ready for the Baltimore game, there's no reason that we don't win.
This team can certainly go 10-6 or 11-5. If they do that, they're in the playoffs. Lots of mediocre teams in the AFC this year, and lots of room for us to sneak in with a not-so-great season. Plus, if we somehow do make the playoffs, I'll take a team with a healthy Ben, healthy Troy and a head of steam any day of the week and twice on Sunday (which is important if they ever have to play a double-header).
So, 6-5 sucks. It reinforces just how important that loss to the Chiefs could end up being, too. If this team is 7-4 (and, ultimately, 9-4 after these next two weeks), I'd be sitting here saying, yeah, whatever, we lost with our backup in. Who cares? We're still basically a lock for the playoffs. But all hope is not lost.
And this season really isn't all that different from 2005, when you think about it. Coming off of a stellar season, everyone expected the team to be that much better. After a great start (7-2 that year, 6-2 this year), they lost 3 straight, in part due to an injury to Ben. During that 3 game losing streak, they also lost a disappointing home game to eventual division champ Cincy, and an overtime game to the Ravens on the road.
We were also playing the NFC North as our non-conference schedule, too. Well, all I'm gonna say is that if we do find a way into the playoffs, people should watch out.
As for the rest of the sports world:
- I'm bored with the Tiger story. However, the fact that Tiger Woods has texted the words "I am going to wear you out...when was the last time you were fucked" really is mindblowing.
- Deadspin posted a report by some ND blogger that says that Brian Kelly of Cincinnati's gonna take the job. I buy it, and hope that it's true. I could recruit quality talent at ND. What they need is someone who can actually coach.
- I never knew that there were articles written about poker players. Did you know that "Isildur1" is on the cusp of being in the top-10 in the world? That's right, a guy who is known by nothing more than a fucking avitar is considered one of the best players in the world. Fucking lame.
- I was looking at a site this week that brought me close to quitting the whole blogging thing forever. The website is called http://bleacherreport.com/. What I found was a bunch of sad, middle-aged men who I guess sit around pretending to be real live journalists, writing serious columns that are really nothing more than B- papers for a freshman journalism class. It was really depressing. The one guy uses the word "myopic" 3 times on his profile page. And you misspelled "fiancee".
Their Tiger Woods is especially interesting - with article titles such as "Alleged Tiger Woods Mistresses Need to Shoulder Some of the Blame" to "Tiger Woods Is in Deep Rough: Can He Par The Course?" Hehe, that last one is pretty great. Maybe I'll start titling everyone of my posts in pun form. We could call this one "Steelers stopped for a loss in Baltimore - face 3rd and long for remainder of season". Or maybe not. Maybe I'll realize how fucking hackneyed that would be.
But I guess that the site is intended to be a way for writers to "catch their big break". You know, publish some stuff in a very public forum and then hope that some of the folks at ESPN who have hiring power just happen to spend some of their day reading this grade-school dribble. True, this isn't any better, but at least I'm not fooling anyone. - Back to Tiger for one more second. Why does everyone keep using the word "transgressions". I propose that we change the word "transgressions", whenever used in reference to Tiger Woods to "fucking a bunch of women that aren't [Tiger Woods'] wife, potentially costing [Tiger Woods] hundreds of millions of dollars, and most importantly, creating a horrendously negative behavior model for his two young children".
- The Pens won again last night - beat the Avalanche 4-1, including a pair of empty-netters. For a team that was supposed to finish somewhere around 14th in the west, they're a feisty, well-coached team, and they're going to be a pain in someone's ass come playoff time. I can definitely see them in one of those 3OT games you used to see from the Stars and Canucks. They're really young, but things look good for Colorado for 2-3 years from now.
But on the team that really matters, the Pens have won their last 3 games by a total score of 17-6, with Sid putting in 11 points himself (7 goals, 4 assists). He's playing maybe the most dominating hockey I've ever seen from him. The switch from wood to composite, that Sid thinks has given him more power and control on his shot, has definitely coincided with an increased scoring touch. Whether its actually the stick, or an increased confidence in his own shot (and hence, more incentive for him to shoot) is unclear. What I do know, though, there isn't a more dangerous player in the league right now. - While we're on hockey, I was secretly pleased to see Alex Ovechkin snag a 2-game suspension for another knee-on-knee hit. It's a very interesting situation, because not only is he a face of NHL, but his "faults" are related, at least in most people's minds, to playing the game too hard and being too competitive. Now, it may just be that because he's such a talented player, people give him the benefit of the doubt, while guys like Sean Avery and Jarkko Rutuu are presumed to be "dirty" players. Either way, the guy seems to have a tendancy to stick his leg out, and to board players on a somewhat regular basis. And that's a problem.
If you ask me, I think it's related to Ovie trying to be something that he's not. He's so image-conscious that he's trying to hard to seem like the "ultimate competitor", the guys that will do anything to help his team win. But in reality, he probably never really learned how to check growing up. Additionally, the guy's playing style has always been to move at 100 MPH straight ahead all the time. This has created a lot of success in the offensive zone (though it does cause him to get caught out of position sometimes), but you really can't play that way on the defensive end.
He says he won't change his style of play, and that's his choice. But my question is - what happens when he takes out a big player the next time. He got away with Gonch in the playoffs because he had never really had issues with that before. But what happens if he takes out a team's star, like Kovalchuk in Atlanta, Gaborik in NY, or, god forbid, one of the two-headed monster for the Pens? What happens when the NHL's poster boy makes the next dirty play, and it happens to sideline a star of the league for a long period of time?
All I know is that the dude needs to learn how to play the game. He plays it like a child, and that will only work for so long. This isn't the minors anymore, and he can't dominate every player, every night. True, no one back in Russia could stop you like this. But he has to get over that. He might be the best player in the world. But he's not unstoppable, and that's OK. I actually hadn't noticed this until I watched the video in that link just now - after he skates to the bench, he sits down, and lets out an exhasperated "whaaaaaaat?" that was less frustration, and more shock and disappointment, like a spoiled 8-year-old single child who showed up at school and realized that not everyone was going to give him what he wants all the time.
So, my conclusion is that Ovechkin needs to grow up, both as a person and as a hockey player. He needs to recognize that there will be obsticles to his success, and that he won't win every time or every year. He further needs to recognize that playing with such a petty style where he feels that he has the right to drag his leg out to trip other players, or shove them head-first into the boards is going to shorten his career. We saw it with Eric Lindros (allbeit that his problem was skating with his head down too much, it was still a reckless, immature style of play that ultimately cost him when he got on the ice with the best players in the world), and we all know how his career turned out, despite his immense talent.
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