Steeler vs. hated Ravens Review

I have to say that I'm very conflicted about the victory last night.

On the one hand, we won and a win is a win and wins are awesome. On the other hand, Mewelde Moore is now at the top of the depth chart at running back and an offensive line that was already short on quality starters lost a quality starter in Kendall Simmons.

On the one hand, Moore came up huge... on the other hand, he's our only healthy back and the Steelers are now talking to Najeh Freakin' Davenport and Gary Russell. Why is it, exactly, that we can't bring back Verron Haynes? Or Dan Kreider? What did those guys do to Tomlin? They seriously must have had a three-way with his sister.

On the one hand, the defense and special teams were excellent (Mitch Berger -- from now on referred to as Bitch Merger -- does not count towards this... if anything, special teams gets points deducted because Bitch is on them. Man, I miss vulva. And the punter we drafted last year that's on injured reserve, I miss him, too.) One the other hand, the offense looked pretty damn craptastic and awful.

Jeff Reed is getting to the point where he's automatic. He's hit 30 of his last 32 attempts, dating back to last season. The only two kicks he has missed were a 65-yarder in Denver and a 38-yarder (okay, I made that number up, but the Denver number is right) last year in the quagmire of bullshit that was the field for the Monday night game against the Dolphins. Those are the only two attempts he's missed. And he kicks in Heinz Field, one of the worst stadiums to kick in in the NFL. And he's in the AFC North, so he has to kick outdoors a lot in November, December, and (sometimes) January in such hot spots as Cleveland, Cincinnati, and Baltimore. And he's got Bitch Merger placing his kicks for him and Greg Warren (I'm still watching you, 60, you better not fuck up) snapping. I can see why the Steelers hit him with the, "Don't even think about trying to sign this guy," restricted free agent tender a few years back. He's worth what we pay him. And then some.

Unlike, say, someone else that we tagged recently. But I'll get to that in a minute.

Mendenhall, Simmons, and Vulva are all on IR. Fast Willie is hurt. Carey Davis... it's an ankle injury and he's a third string guy, but it's still not good. Casey Hampton is hurt (already declared out for Week 5 in Jacksonville). Brett Keisel is going to miss at least another couple of games. Deshea is hurt, but I think they're just resting him and saying that he's hurt worse than he is so McFadden can fully take over the job.

At any rate, there are a ton of injuries and the Steelers had to overcome all of them, plus a very good Ravens defense, plus an uncharacteristically calm rookie with one hell of a unibrow, plus a ten point deficit, plus the fact that the home crowd actually booed them before the half. All this is not to mention all 840 pounds of LeRon McClain. That dude's good. Like a skinny Ironhead Hayward, or a fat Jerome Bettis.

Here's the thing: I think that the Monday night game against the hated Ravens will be looked at as a turning point in the season. I think that everyone's going to rally together, get better together, that the defense is going to be able to carry the offense until it improves (and gets healthy), and that, aside from Bitch, the kicking game is going to continue to be strong. And, really, I think Bitch will get better because he can't get much worse.

If nothing else, we've got a big game quarterback with balls and a big time kicker with balls. Guess what? If Tomlin can at least make his way to "smart," with no pressure to get to "uber genius," we'll have most of the pieces of the puzzle that made the Patriots practically unbeatable this century. I mean, we've always had the "opportunistic defense that makes a play at the right time," right?

So, now that we have all the pieces in place, Tomlin just needs to get a little better (that'll happen in time) and then we'll start winning shitloads of Super Bowls. Well, maybe not shitloads, but I could see one or two by the time Tomlin, Roethlisberger, and Reed all retire.

(I'm completely serious here. I am not kidding. I think this is going to be a great team for a long time because of the nucleus of guys we have right now. And last night's game might just be what flips the switch for all of them.)

Now that I've engaged in a huge stroke fest, here's some good, old fashioned negativity for you...

1. Tomlin or LeBeau need to make a decision on this Foote/Timmons situation. Timmons is too good to sit on the bench, but Foote isn't bad, either. They don't want to shatter anyone's confidence, so it's a bad situation, but I think it's time to pull the plug. Let Timmons take over, have Foote just in case. The linebackers are getting better by the day and Foote is bringing the general quality of play down -- not way down, because he's still a pretty damn good player, but he's not as good as Timmons at this point.
2. Looks like they're going to sign Gary Russell and Najeh Davenport. However, in addition to Verron Haynes being available, there are two guys that I find far more intriguing than Russell and the Closet Pooper. That would be Mike Bell and Noah Herron. Neither guy is a Pro Bowl-caliber player, but they're both better than Davenport or Russell. They both can catch the ball out of the back field, aren't players on the decline, and have handled starting duties before. As a matter of fact, Herron was originally drafted by the Steelers, so he's familiar with a lot of the guys on offense, even if he's not familiar with Arians' system in particular. And, since the Arians offense is similar to the Whisenhunt offense, Herron shouldn't have to spend too much time learning it.
3. Of course, they're not going to sign Herron or Bell, because those guys are free agents from other teams. They prefer to re-sign and re-tread their guys, guys that are familiar with what it takes to be a Steeler, but weren't good enough to make the roster (or, since the Steelers don't take castaways, any roster). That's great. That's cream-of-the-crop shit right there. Way to go. Don't sign the best guy available, sign the guy that you didn't want as recently as six weeks ago. Nice. (Editor's Note: Haynes and Kreider are exempt from this argument, because they obviously gave Tomlin's sister an Angry Dragon, a Lumberjack, and a Dirty Sanchez when they had the three-way with her. That's obviously why they haven't been picked back up.)
   
4. Speaking of scraping the bottom of the barrel... what in the holy fuck is Darnell Fucking Stapleton doing starting at right guard in place of Kendall Simmons? You're supposed to get your top five guys out there, right? Well, Tony Hills and Trai Essex were inactive last night. Ten offensive linemen on the roster, two inactives, five starters, and Darnell Fucking Stapleton gets the call. Sure, he may be the top back-up at right guard. I'll buy that. But why start him next week? Why declare that already? Why not put Willie Colon at right guard and put, oh, gee, I don't know, the $7 million man, Max Starks in at right tackle? Why not? Because he sucks fucking balls, that's why not. Because signing Starks to that transitional tag is the single worst decision any Steelers GM has made since they let Johnny Fucking Unitas go. Why not put Starks in and shift Colon over? Why? Because Starks was worse than Darnell Fucking Stapleton (henceforth DFS) and was, at best, the seventh-best lineman out of eight active guys. It's one thing to draft the guy, it's another thing to pay him about as much as, oh, I don't know, say, Alan Faneca is making this season to basically be inactive. Admit your failure, Kevin Colbert. Put him on the inactive list. Let Mr. Drop Foot, Tony Hills, dress for the rest of the season. Let Starks wear sweats and a ball cap. Actually, let him wear a suit made of solid gold. Don't worry. He can fucking afford it.
5. I didn't realize how big of a deal Vulva getting placed on IR was. Bitch Merger is terrible. It'd be great if we could call Paul Ernster and get him on the roster, but he's worse than Bitch. He actually couldn't beat Bitch out for a job. I really hope that Vulva's okay and that we'll have him next year. You know how they say that for every kicker that has a job, there's five guys that are just as good that don't? Well, they're completely full of bullshit, whoever they are. I want my Vulva back.
6. Half the team is hurt and we play another bunch of bruisers on the road in Jacksonville on Sunday night. So, that's not good.

One positive. After the Jaguars, we only face three great defenses in the next 11 games (Tennessee, Baltimore, and the Giants). We face a couple other good defenses (Washington and New Englad), I have no idea what to expect from either of those teams. They may have completely self-destructed by the time we play them.

We also get a bye after this game. Then the Bungles. Thank God.