On a Scale of 1-10

[BrettsBeard]

Hello everyone! I recently discovered this place after lurking, and occasionally posting, on the hockey equivalent of this site for years.

I found this website because I am more excited for the season than usual. On a scale of 1 to 10 (“I’ll watch maybe one game“ to “Don’t even bother calling me on Sunday”), what is your level anticipation for the team, or the return of games in general, compared to the beginning of recent seasons?

 

I would say my level of excitement is an 8. There seem to be a lot of new players and young talent, and I think a lot of us hope the Steelers will play as a team more than they have in a long time. Will JuJu and Connor excel because of playing with chips on their shoulders? Will Ben Roethlisberger have fewer interceptions due to not needing to force the ball to Abnormally Bighead, or is he simply declining? Will kicker Chris Boswell be the cause of multiple losses again? Will Mike Tomlin have the team prepared or learn how to use timeouts? (HA...I already know the answer to those last two.) In general, I am also excited to see if the Browns live up to the hype (I’m sure the Steelers will do their part by being frustrating for at least one of the two games), and I want to watch the Toxic Twins on their new teams!

 

So, how excited are you for the season, and why?

[VigilantZombie]

12.

Win or lose I think week 1 is gonna be a great game and it will tell us a lot about our roster

[3rivers]

I don't know what to expect because ben hasn't played well for the last several septembers and butler is still the DC. Talent speaking, I could see this team getting 11 wins, but then there's the coaching and injuries etc. Supposedly the locker room cancers are gone and the team is actually without drama  (for now anyways) , so that could help

[Livewire]

First of all welcome to the site.

I'm excited for this season because for the first time in a few years I I think I'm going to like this team again. The past seasons the team has been so unlikable, for me, with all the crap that has gone on. With dumb and dumber gone it seems like there is a breath of fresh air with the team now. I think this team can make a lot of noise this season. The addition of Bush is huge. The defense is faster and he should elevate everyone's game. I'm cautiously optimistic that the Steelers can go far.

[Money]

Here are my concerns - What does paint the barn red even mean? 

So, I checked...

 

Rust was plentiful on farms and because it killed fungi and mosses that might grow on barns, and it was very effective as a sealant. It turned the mixture red in color. When paint became more available, many people chose red paint for their barns in honor of tradition.

So, in tradition, Brady torches the Steelers. Is that what he's saying? He's expecting a torching, because I generally agree. 

 

The offensive line is a major factor and is the Genesis for why the team will have a quick Exodus on any sort of talk of playoffs. Leviticus may discuss the Division of Labor. And, obviously, the schematics will be flawed. But, uhh... The standard is still the standard. And the team will fall short. For every reason but a general lack of TomlinISMS keeping the unit intact. The general lack of leadership and direction stemming from the Owner to the HC to the QB. All the way down. 

I'm not quite sure you noticed this, but the trench work, ahh, it's subpar. That ain't gonna work. They are net neutral in terms of turnover at the position, but they lost the guy preparing the team week in and week out. The only unit that is prepared will now no longer be prepared, and they have regressed to the days of Kugler. Decent bloodlines. Kids have a couple of rings. I immediately noticed a lack of push and collapsing of pockets. This has gotta be with the lack of preparedness and recognizing the everchanging nuances of defenses and being caught off guard and get blown up. Cooks like to be in the Kitchen.

 

Offensively, you'll end up in poor situations. 2nd & 7 as opposed to 2nd & 6. 3rd & 9. As opposed to 3rd & 5. It will literally EAT at your soul. It's gonna be frustrating. They're not gonna have the big play bailout that they relied on in certain years. Antonio Brown mitigated a few things. Including not only the big play. But, the general schematics and we better keep an eye on 84. That's the Elephant in the Room. That no one wants to talk about. Teams will stuff the box. And stuff Conner. When they stuff Conner, they will make the Steelers one dimensional. When the Steelers are one dimensional, and the line is a mess, Ben will take sacks. When Ben takes sacks, he will chew out his teammates and lose a team that he lost some time ago. It'll be a remix of last year. And the cancer still remains. 

____________

Defensively. You still got the same guy getting jumped. And playing checkers. Nice Blitz, Butler. Now, they'll just dink and dunk and somehow come back from 2nd & 18 and end up getting the first down with a few "splash plays". Not really. But that's a TomlinISM. They'll take 9 on a back shoulder or hitch or some garbage bs. You know they aren't going to get it back at once. You know it. And then on 3rd & 9, as he sits back in his zone, they'll clear out the CB by running a fly and drop the back underneath in the vacated zone. So, he'll put Bush on the RB. Man to Man. And then they'll hit you over the middle of the field. Or up the seam. And expose your soft zone. It just ain't hard to defeat this clown. 

They'll get pressure. But they won't get turnovers. They lack a general consistent outside rush where the QB feels uneasy in the pocket. That's how you make them make mistakes. These guys don't make mistakes. When his back foot hits in his drop, he's got to have someone in his face. Consistently. Pressure are better than sacks. So, the next time, his back foot hits the ground, he hesitates. Bc of fear and tears. And that's all the margin of error you need to have INTs, incompletions, batted balls, etc. (i.e. mistakes). If you have instinctic and athletic CBs and DBs on the back-end. Which we don't have. And, which, we won't get. Something the defense never generates. Turnovers. Teams take their medicine on a good called blitz. And then Paint with a Broad Brush. Slowly but surely overcoming the negative play. Chunk after chunk. Hey you guys! Which, not only is demoralizing to the defense, not too mention, keeps them on the field longer, but it gives the offense a boost going forward.

_______________

The franchise has had one good special teams play in the entire history of the franchise. Surprise onside in the Super Bowl. Had it not been for Neil O'Donnell, Sean Payton's ballsy call would not live in lore. On punts, the gunners don't cover. The punter doesn't have enough hang time. And directionally, it is never out of bounds. I will take flipping net 40 yards of field position. Every time. With this crew. 45 yards would be a blessing. He'll boom one. Berry. This bum. 52 yards. Max leg here. With 4 seconds of hangtime. A bullet. Right in the middle of the field. Might as well be a stinger. And they'll return in 10, 15, 20 yards. Every time. Maybe rack. Like in the LAC game. Just kick it out of bounds. Or with some air, please. Give your guys a shot.

Then when we return. We got Switzy. The King of the Lip Tat. It probably says somin like "dirty". If he returns it, he tries to Dante Hall. And we get a hold/block in the back call. Because you're not Dante Hall. Call it net 60 yards of field position for the opposing team. When he doesn't do that, he fair catches it 85% of the time. I mean, okay, Belichick's guy returns it every time. Because, they actually block. To give him a shot. He got balls. And he runs straight ahead. Bee Line. 10-15 yards. Right up the field. Net field position 35 yards for Belichick's team. And when Switzer does go straight ahead. He ducks and cover. After 8.2 yards per return. These yards add up. And they make it harder to score. And field position is why crap teams like the Bears even made it to a Super Bowl.

We got KR. See above. Switzy. 19 yards per return. Starting most drives inside the 25 yard line. Because teams hit a pop up and dare us to return. Another loss of field position. When we kick, we either kick it through the end zone, which is rare, or they return it to the 25 yard line. Or better. Granted, I'm less scared when teams return nowadays. Like, it's not like they're going to break one every time. And I'm just trembling in fear. It's like. We take our haircut and move on. Other teams, don't cut their hair. Win the field position battle. And they just Swing their Sword. 

_________________________________

Coaching and a general lack of preparedness. As they paint barns and cook in the kitchen and paint with a broad brush on Tuesday for Arts and Crafts. I'm not sure which coach on this team is qualified. The GM is qualified. And that's about it. But, he's, obviously, tired of the circus act and doesn't even want to renegotiate. The coaching staff is just like Old Grandpas. Bill Lynch. The Rooney's are cheap in nature. Maybe that's another Genesis. For failure. And they refuse to Exodus the mundane and dim witted bulbs burrowing in obscurity. Cheap in nature. Yanno, I got a $1 tip from Dan Rooney when I was a busboy when I was 16. At Rico's. Can't believe I don't have it. 

You know Tomlin. He'll blow a game (or two) with not having a clue on timeouts. And the challenges of pass interference. There's no way he'll get that right. He'll be busy painting the barn red. Obviously, he may lose track of where he is on the field, when managing a game is too much to handle, and may even stumble on the field in a feeble attempt to divert attention from the true problems at hand. The Elephant in the Room. That's you, Tomlin. And TheRapist. And that timeout will kill us. Wouldn't it be nice to have 90 seconds on the final drive to win the game.... as opposed to just 45 seconds. Butler is a joke. High School is right for you, Butler. We'll work you in with Art Walker. And you can coach the LB's. You got Fichtner. These other teams got these dynamic partnerships. These guys out there making hundreds of millions.... in profit. You think you can have some innovators of the game coaching the team. No. We're still out here painting with a broad brush. From Salvation Army. 

Danny Smith. You think we can get him a deal with Orbit. That might do less work on his jaw and he might have the ability to (actually) coach. The cupcake schedule might not even be enough to save this team this year. 

 

Prediction: 6 to 9 wins, in 100% of all simulations. 

[43M]

5.  My love of the NFL has plummeted significantly, and while I will always love my Steelers, watching the front office and coaching make the same mistakes year in and year out has really dampened how excited I can get about this team any more.

This is still a playoff caliber team, but I wont be shocked if they miss due to stupid mistakes....and once we get to the playoffs, I have little faith in the coaches or Ben to take us far.

[VigilantZombie]

It's crazy but I think this team should easily have 7 of 8 SB wins with the talent they've had. I am NOT blaming it all on coaching but how many times can we point to the coaching and honestly say "this cost us the game"? Too many.

Same can be said about players that were kept when better were available only for said player to have just 1 key play all year, which happened to be a game losing fumble or something to that degree. And huge swing and misses in the 1st round.

Jarvis Jones, Artie Burns, Bud Dupree most recently. None of those positions have truly been corrected.

I want to tell you, truly, that I believe we are going to win the SB this year but then I'd have to tell you I've thought that every year for like the last 6 years.

I really am excited about this season but I completely understand where 43M is coming from.

[Chieferific]

1 hour ago, FourThreeMafia said:

5.  My love of the NFL has plummeted significantly, and while I will always love my Steelers, watching the front office and coaching make the same mistakes year in and year out has really dampened how excited I can get about this team any more.

This is still a playoff caliber team, but I wont be shocked if they miss due to stupid mistakes....and once we get to the playoffs, I have little faith in the coaches or Ben to take us far.

What were some of the same mistakes this year? Not saying there aren't any but I've been pleased with some of things they did and cleaned up this off-season. 

[VigilantZombie]

17 minutes ago, Chieferific said:

What were some of the same mistakes this year? Not saying there aren't any but I've been pleased with some of things they did and cleaned up this off-season. 

I think not trying to use the Sutton smith, zach gentry and Derwin gray picks to move up and get a better TE could be one. Idk that they didnt try, I'm speculating that they didnt. 

Not addressing safety depth beyond Kam Kelly perhaps.

 

[Chieferific]

1 hour ago, wwhickok said:

I think not trying to use the Sutton smith, zach gentry and Derwin gray picks to move up and get a better TE could be one. Idk that they didnt try, I'm speculating that they didnt. 

Not addressing safety depth beyond Kam Kelly perhaps.

 

Meh, IDK. Let's not forget we do have a quality starting TE. Yes he is an injury concern but I'm not gonna complain too much that they didn't move up in the later Rds for a depth player. I think they're happy with the Safety position. They seem to like Davis, they just drafted Edmunds. They could use Hilton in a pinch a Baron could step in too. You can disagree with that assessment (I do to a degree) but wouldn't necessarily call that a mistake. It's more a difference of opinion. They seem to have gotten lucky with Kelly. I don't think they could have drafted a better Safety in the later Rds. 

[43M]

3 hours ago, Chieferific said:

What were some of the same mistakes this year? Not saying there aren't any but I've been pleased with some of things they did and cleaned up this off-season. 

The season hasnt started yet.    Im talking more about the in game coaching mistakes, playing down to lesser teams, shooting ourselves in the foot and Tomlin not learning from past mistakes.

Its a long standing pattern and I dont expect anything to change.  

[Chieferific]

1 minute ago, FourThreeMafia said:

The season hasnt started yet.    Im talking more about the in game coaching mistakes, playing down to lesser teams, shooting ourselves in the foot and Tomlin not learning from past mistakes.

Its a long standing pattern and I dont expect anything to change.  

Ah, yeah that makes sense. I don't expect much progress there. We'll find out early Week 1. 

[43M]

5 minutes ago, Chieferific said:

Ah, yeah that makes sense. I don't expect much progress there. We'll find out early Week 1. 

I mean, its more of a season long thing.    We have actually played the Patriots pretty tough for several years.  We beat them last year and shouldve beat them the year before.   

Tomlin usually has this team prepared for better teams.

However, some decisions within those games often hurt us, and our preparation and readiness vs lesser teams is often embarrassing.    

Team consistency just isnt there week to week.     The team competes for the playoffs every year, but I cant remember the last time I truly felt we could go all the way.     Ive gotten my hopes up at times, but looking back at it, its probably been 6 or 7 years.

[Chieferific]

2 minutes ago, FourThreeMafia said:

I mean, its more of a season long thing.    We have actually played the Patriots pretty tough for several years.  We beat them last year and shouldve beat them the year before.   

Tomlin usually has this team prepared for better teams.

However, some decisions within those games often hurt us, and our preparation and readiness vs lesser teams is often embarrassing.    

Team consistency just isnt there week to week.     The team competes for the playoffs every year, but I cant remember the last time I truly felt we could go all the way.     Ive gotten my hopes up at times, but looking back at it, its probably been 6 or 7 years.

Unfortunately, I can't argue with any of that.  

[Neumatic]

4, Not really excited. I might be slightly more excited if I thought the media would stop starting **** about AB not being here. Probably be the talk every single week on every single broadcast.

Mainly my interest in the NFL has been waning, I’ll get a little more excited once we get a few weeks in. I haven’t even payed any attention to football yet.