Steelers drama
- Thread starter Nitt1300
- Start date
As a longtime fan, it's just a bad group of guys. Roster full of wastoids, dweebies and dickheads. Ben, Bell, Brown....bad dudes. Pot heads or aholes. You have Tomlin who IS a bad coach on the sidelines and lets his players get away with whatever. Combine that with a bad drafting record, a salary cap that has been a mess for a decade, you have what you have now. I stopped following them closely a couple of years ago. They need an entirely new regime brought in, from the GM down.
Not a bad team, but under-performed this year. Some are overlooking just how consistently the team wins over the last 15 years.
Changes needed, but not major housecleaning IMO.
One thing at a time -- Antonio Brown has to go, and hopefully has some trade value.
Changes needed, but not major housecleaning IMO.
One thing at a time -- Antonio Brown has to go, and hopefully has some trade value.
I agree people take for granted how much the Steelers win and there's no way you can fire Tomlin at this point but I do think this is a wake up call for him on how it's not good to let the inmates run the asylum. Being a players coach is one thing but that can be taken too far. I suspect he'll start to enforce a little discipline and also the Steelers will be more careful about who they give big, longterm contracts too.
The shocker for me was a few years ago when Tomlin was addressing the team in the locker room after a game and Antonio Brown is streaming a Facebook video and clowning around...while you can hear Tomlin talk in the background! Ignoring the HC in a time like that is bad enough but streaming on Facebook during it? Wow!
The shocker for me was a few years ago when Tomlin was addressing the team in the locker room after a game and Antonio Brown is streaming a Facebook video and clowning around...while you can hear Tomlin talk in the background! Ignoring the HC in a time like that is bad enough but streaming on Facebook during it? Wow!
The Steelers would incur a $21MM cap hit if they part ways with him before June 1. Even after the 1st the cap hit the following year would still be significant. It is going to be awfully tough to move him.
I don't understand how those accounting rules work. You'd think if a team traded a guy that was scheduled to be paid X dollars then that team would have X dollars taken off the amount it's spending and thus would have more cap room, not less. Why does it cost you cap room when you GET RID OF a player making a lot of money?
I could see how it could be negotiated with the new team, like, we'll give you so and so draft picks for him but you have to count half his salary against your cap instead of us counting it all against our cap. That seems logical although I don't know if it's in the rules.
ETA: Here's a long explanation that clears things up.
https://overthecap.com/the-steelers-options-with-antonio-brown/
The problem with this is he's let certain players get away with things for so long. You have to start the discipline from the beginning and be consistent. Veteran guys will just quit on him if he all of a sudden turns into a disciplinarian. I think the ship has sailed. I doubt the Steelers renew his contract this off season, and I'm ok with that.
Not sure what the answer is for the Steelers but one thing is for certain, Mike Tomlin lost control of this team.
The Steelers' clown show can be traced to Cowher. Before Cowher, character was a consideration when players were drafted. Under Art Rooney Sr. and Chuck Noll the Steelers had players like Swann, Bount, Russell, Ham, etc. Character mattered. Cowher decided to draft thugs who were willing to throw their bodies around. Character no longer mattered. Joey Porter is a good example. Mike Tomlin has followed Cowher's lead.
Can you imagine players like Bell or Brown lasting more than a few seconds on the team if Noll was still there? I can't.
Can you imagine players like Bell or Brown lasting more than a few seconds on the team if Noll was still there? I can't.
Yah, because the rest of the NFL is just teaming with character. Get a grip. It’s not the team, it’s the era.
This is true.
Way back I remember Noll getting rid of the best player on his first team, Roy Jefferson.
Personally, I think Antonio is suffering from some form of mania. I also heard he was a jerk in college.
Good point. I guess there aren't a lot of Lynn Swanns and Andy Russells to pick from today (although Barkley seems like a throwback to that era). Maybe that is why an authoritarian no nonsense coach like Belichick is needed to control today's players.
And Tomlin can't just flip a switch and act like Belichick next year or the players will revolt. You have to start that with a new franchise and new faces.
Remember the issue with Villanueva last year and how he had to defend himself of going out of the locker room for the national anthem. Brown saw how Leveon Bell worked the system and now he decided to do the same. No coming back from that. Steelers have to clean house starting with Tomlin and several guys on the team that are troublemakers. Problem is that means they are going to take a few steps back in the W column for a couple of years until the rebuild a little through draft and some good free agent pick-ups which is not easy. But has to be done. The Ben era is over.
Belichek has had his share of a-holes also. Drafted and put up with Aaron Hernandez after Urb Meyer let it be known the kid was a powder keg. Recently they knew Josh Gordon had a major drug problem and thought assigning people to follow him around would keep Gordon eligible. Major fail.
Boy, you're lucky. As a Redskins fan I'd kill for what the Steelers have right now. Sad, I know.
FWIW, the Washington media is savaging Snyder, unanimous in their wish for president Bruce Allen to be let go. It's really pathetic, the brand they have now.
Ben's an a-hole but he's a good QB and I think Steeler fans take it for granted. There aren't many good QBs and lots of teams have to go without one. When Ben hangs them up in a few years the Steelers might be in for hard times. Drafting a QB high is no guarantee he'll be good.
I think it's fair to say that the Steelers have underachieved in this recent several year run with the three Bs and now one is gone, another may be gone soon and the third will be gone in a few years. No way the Steelers can Tomlin now but if this is the start of a multiple year slide it could happen down the road.
Remember right before the PLAYOFF GAME last year Bell said he'd sit out next year if he didn't get a contract? That said it all to me.
I'm genuinely curious why would the Steelers would sign a QB. Camp arm? Roethlisberger, Dobbs and Rudolph are all definitely back in 2019.
Ernie "Fats" Holmes
Three playoff wins total in the last 9 years with a hall of fame quaterback, hall of fame wide receiver. For the Steelers, that's like decade of the 1980s futility. What is it going to look like without that hall of fame QB?
Well, certainly not as good. Just looking at priorities -- seems to me Ben is still playing well; he had a good season in yards and TDs, is not quite so much a knucklehead off the field, and may have 2 to 3 good years left.
Worth a 2019 1st round draft choice to go with the next QB? I think probably not, and there are other needs, actually more on the defensive side IMO.
Google the name Ernie Holmes and get back to me about the “character” from the Noll and the Chief days. I’m as huge a fan of those old teams as any, but facts matter, and the fact is that the Steelers are no different than any other team when it comes to their history of low character guys from all eras.
I remember the "Criminal Element" situation as a kid. This article speaks to a lot more that was happening in 1977 with Noll and the Steelers. Some of the player fines are laughable. $200. Haha.
What probably has changed from then to now is that players make substantially more money and can act like prima donna without fear of recourse.
https://www.steelers.com/news/labriola-on-the-no-1-distraction-in-team-history-19690727
Trade Brown and Bell to football Siberia like the Jets or the Cardinals where they can rack up all the stats they want and never play in a Super Bowl. The Steelers have played in zero Super Bowls with Brown and Bell and they'd have a lot more cap room.
Good point - for all of their physical talents, they have yet to contribute to a championship team.
And, now that that has happened, the proverbial “Genie” is out of the bottle. Tomlinson cannot put the toothpaste back in the tube after the fact without a revolt. If the Rooney’s wait until his contract expires and don’t renew, they then waste the last likely “productive” years Ben has to provide. How can Tomlin extricate himself from the shit hole he has dug?
How can the Rooney’s possibly justify keeping a guy who has lost control of the team with no feasible path to rectification while openly admitting that he utilizes inferior processes to handle game day sideline decisions? These game day issues include: replay decisions, two point conversion decisions and clock management issues.
Bell is already gone and Brown did play in the Superbowl that they lost to the Packers.
