16 Reasons the Redskins Make Me Poop My Pants

I really don't know too much about the Redskins. I know that they have a racially offensive team name, that they have a crazy owner that likes to spend lots of money, and they used to employ Joe Theismann, which makes me hate them.

At any rate (how about 4.5%?), on to the 16 Reasons the Redskins Make Me Poop My Pants.

1. Clinton Portis is currently tearing up the league, with 944 yards in his first eight games. He's also had four or five straight games of 120 yards, which ties a record set by OJ Simpson. I'm thinking that the Steelers defenders don't want him to set a record against them. It seems as though any time a team has a chance to set a record against them, the team says, "We don't care how good you are or how much we suck. No. Just, no." Most recent examples include the fact that we almost let Jamal Lewis get the single-season rushing yardage record against us in 2003 until we realized that he might set it. From that point on, I think he got 8 yards on 10 carries or something. And, leave us not forget how we stopped the Patriots winning streak in 2004.
2. Also, in 2005, we became the first six seed to win the Super Bowl. Not sure what that has to do anything, but I realized that I hadn't mentioned the Super Bowl XL win in a while.
3. Jason Campbell hasn't thrown an interception thus far this season. Eight games, 230 attempts, zero interceptions. How the fuck does that even happen? Can you think of anything you've ever done 230 straight times without something bad happening? Even if it wasn't your fault. You have to figure a tipped ball or miscommunication with the receiver would cause at least one at some point in there, right?
4. Campbell's lack of interceptions leads me to believe that the Redskins are this year's Chargers and this year's 2005 Bengals. Not hugely talented, but they win because they play smart and catch a lot of breaks. A lot has to do with how the ball bounces. The Giants haven't lost a fumble this year and nothing bad happened when Brandon Jacobs just let the ball pop out on Sunday. That's one of the reasons they're 6-1. They're a good team, too, but it helps a lot when you catch breaks.
5. Really don't know what to make of Jim Zorn. I mean, he was a lefthanded quarterback and he played for the Seahawks, so both of those things are unnatural. He was never a coordinator or an assistant before he was a head coach, he just took care of the quarterbacks for Seattle. Now, don't get me wrong, I think Matt Hasselback is awesome, I'm just thinking that you don't want to hand the keys to a storied franchise over to a guy with less than no experience. What's that you say about Tomlin and Cowher? Different situation. Cowher got hired 16 years ago and he's still younger than Zorn. Maybe it's just me, but I think that, if you're 55 when you get your first coaching shot, it's possible that the game has passed you by and, really, you should've been a coach by now.
6. On the other hand, he's a rookie coach and he's 6-2. He's already beaten the Cowboys and the Eagles on the road. Jason Campbell has zero interceptions and Clinton Portis is beating the fuck-all out of good teams. So, what do I know?
7. I know that Mike Tomlin kinda hit a wall halfway through last season. That's what I know.
8. There are reports about Willie Parker's knee and Ben Roethlisberger's shoulder. And, while a running back sorta needs healthy knees and it's handy for a quarterback to have a healthy shoulder, I have to say I'm not all that concerned. It's possible that Willie misses a start, but I don't think Ben misses this game for anything. He's got to make up for last week and he's too competitive to sit back and watch Byron Leftwich scamper around behind our craptastic offensive line.
9. I say Willie starts and plays well, BTW. He's had a series of "setbacks" the past couple of weeks, but i think the coaching staff is keeping him on ice and resting him for the stretch run/postseason because they feel confident in Mewelde Moore. However, at this point, I say that Fast Willie feels too uncomfortable with his level of job security to sit this one out.
10. And, I described the offensive line as "craptastic" just now, but I really think they're coming together with the guys they have (I'm pretending that Marvel Smith is in at left tackle and Max Starks is back to wearing sweats) and that DFS is fitting in better than Simmons. I also think that, if they want to play Starks, they need to put him in for Colon. That dude commits two dumbass penalties per game on average. Whenever I see a flag, I start with the assumption that it's on Colon and go from there. I like him, I like his attitude, but he needs to stop being such a dumbass. To put this in perspective, he's being enough of a dumbass that I am suggesting that Max Starks play more instead of him.
11. They've only allowed 16 sacks and, with a quarterback that's as inexperienced as Campbell, that's pretty damn good. I wouldn't say that it's fantastic, but it's pretty damn good. Also, it's not like they played the Bengals every week. They've already played the Giants and Eagles, who combined to sack our quarterbacks 14 times in two games. So, maybe they're good at pass blocking and run blocking, seeing as how we know they're good in the running game.
12. Still, I think LaMarr Woodley and James Harrison can get to Campbell and I think that we're going to hold Portis to about the same numbers that we held Brandon Jacobs to. I just don't see him going off against our defense. I think they're going to need to throw the ball in order to score enough points to win.
13. The Redskins have only 10 sacks on defense in eight games, so they don't have a lot of guys that can get to the quarterback. While that's usually a good thing, since the Steelers line sucks balls at pass blocking and all, the Jets had, like -3 sacks in 20 games going into our game against them last year and they piled up 15 or 20 sacks against us. I may be a little off on the numbers. At any rate, if they're really fired up and they really decide to come after Roethlisberger, they're going to sack him. Even if they don't really try to get him, they're still going to sack him. However, they've been playing very conserative thus far this season on defense after five years of Gregg Williams blitzing when he got off the bus, so I think that they're going to sack Big Ben, but not a lot.
14. They'll be missing Shawn "Puffy" Springs and Jason Taylor... and Sean Taylor. Too soon? Two of their most talented guys in pass defense -- Jason Taylor rushing the QB and Springs trying to intercept him -- will not be playing. And they kinda struggled defending the Lions.
15. Santonio Holmes, fresh and rested from his suspension and smoking a lot of weed, will be back. That helps the passing game a bunch and gives Ben someone reliable to throw to when he goes deep. I swear, if Holmes had traded places with Washington in the Giants game, he would've had three catches for 140 yards and three touchdowns. And we would've won. Don't know why everyone's so enamored with Nate Washington. He's a decent player, but he's no Holmes.
16. Speaking of deep threats, I didn't talk about Santana Moss. That's because I don't think he's going to get us. I think he's going to get a lot of targets deep, but that we'll have three guys stationed at the goal line, so we'll knock everything down that comes near him. I think the guy that kills us is Chris Cooley. Inside the ten and between the 20s. He won't hit on a lot of big plays, but he'll have a Kellen Winslow type of day with 11 catches for 73 yards and two short touchdowns. We haven't done well against tight ends and guys that catch the ball in the red zone this season. I think that trend continues.

Maybe it's that ignorance is bliss, but I am soooooo not worried about the Redskins. They're a good team, they've got some veteran talent, and they'll keep it close late, but I don't think they have the horses.

It's a Monday night game, they're the latest "sleeper" team now that we lost to New York and everyone woke up on the Titans, so they have something to prove, and they're at home. Could be this is where Zorn's bubble bursts and they show disappointed close-ups of Steve Largent throughout the game.

Could be that creepy-ass Dan Snyder hops his way across the field and starts screaming, "We're in first place, bitches!" before paying the PA guy $1.2 million to let him scream it over the loud speakers. But I doubt it.

Prediction:

Steelers 21, Redskins 10

Steelers vs. Giants Review

I have to admit that I'm not all that upset. So, the Bungles lost, but the hated Ravens won and so did Cleveland. But, really, we've got a one game lead on the hated Ravens (which is huge, since they're going to choke down the stretch and we already beat them) and a two game lead on the Browns.

The game we lost was out of conference, so it doesn't matter as much as a conference loss and definitely as much as a division loss.

And, they're the defending champs. They're a good team. You can't turn the ball over against the defending champs and hope to win.

Think of it this way, we played the defending champions, gave up five sacks, four turnovers, gave them six chances in the red zone, and spotted them a safety on a crappy special teams play (Greg Warren, I apologize to you, your loved ones, or anyone that I may have hurt with disparaging comments against you... you're the man and I hope you're not out too long... then again, you're just a long snapper, so if we have to put you on IR, there are ten guys that can replace you easily).

I feel good about our defense. We held Little Brother under 200 yards, we held them in the red zone, and we held the best rushing team in the NFL to 83 total yards. I think that LeBeau held something back. I don't know if it was intentional -- we'll see these guys again, so who cares what happens in a non-conference game -- or if he choked. James Harrison got pressure on Eli when he came on the blitz. LaMarr Woodley got pressure on Eli when he came on the blitz. LeBeau never sent both guys. When they two guys got pressure individually in other games, they came on the same blitz several times during the course of the game... with plays that resulted in sacks.

Logic dictates that you should send both guys, right? Why didn't LeBeau send them both, especially towards the end of the game? If he held something back, shame on him. That was the defending champs. You leave it all on the field.

Ben threw four picks. The line gave up five sacks. But, really, if you think about it, one of those picks was thrown right to a defender, one of them was the result of a tip, and the other two were on fourth down, where it actually would've worked out better for the Giants if the defender involved would just have knocked the ball down and taken the spot.

Five sacks. Two of those were coverage sacks and two of them can be directly attributed to the fact that Max Starks is retarded. Seriously. Three times, he ignored the right end and blocked down, two of those ended up in sacks and one of them ended up with Ben Roethlisberger making it look good by pulling some college shit.

I continue to be impressed with the defense. I continue to be impressed with Mewelde Moore (though I can't wait for Fast Willie to come back). I think the offensive line is actually where it needs to be.

We're still 5-2. This was a tough schedule and we knew this going in. Just gotta suck it up and take some losses.

We played a good game, but the Giants played a better one. That's pretty much all there is to it.

16 Reasons the Giants Make Me Poop My Pants

Well, obviously, since they're the World Champions and they're also 5-1 and all, the Giants do, in fact make me poop my pants. They have a lot of things going for them on both sides of the ball and they may actually have gotten better since their playoff run to end last season.

Would've been nice if the Steelers had done that in 2006 after an equally improbable run, but whatever. Our back-up center missed training camp and our coach retired. We had bigger shit to worry about. And, something about a near-fatal motorcycle accident.

1. So, Eli Manning became the second Manning to win a Super Bowl. He became the second Manning to be named Super Bowl MVP. He became the second quarterback from the 2004 draft class to win the Big One. The first guy was also the youngest quarterback to do it. Some guy with a German name that's tough to spell. I think he wrecked his car or something. At any rate, I think Eli is tired of playing second fiddle and he's really trying to come into his own. He's not as turnover prone as he used to be, he doesn't turtle when the pass rush comes, and he generally makes a sound, accurate throw when he needs to. He'll never be as great statistically as his brother, because that clown Kevin Gilbride is his offensive coordinator, but he's pretty damn good.
2. Thing is, you never know when Bad Eli might come out. Sure, he's more consistent than Rex Grossman, but he's less consistent than Tom Brady, or even Ben Roethlisberger. And, his big brother Peyton is having a hell of a time thus far, so it just goes to show that anyone can go through a rough patch. Granted, if you follow that logic trail, that also means that Roethlisberger can hit a rough patch. Let's move on.
3. The Giants have the best run offense in the NFL. The Steelers have the second best run defense. Something's gotta give in this match-up and I really think it's going to be the Steelers. I don't think we'll allow anyone to rush for 100 yards -- partially because the Giants have three good guys to hand the ball to -- but I think they're going to be able to run the ball consistently on us and have some success. If you're worried about starting Brandon Jacobs in your fantasy league, don't worry. Start the man.
4. Speaking of Jacobs, a lot of people (myself included) wanted the Steelers to take him in the 2006 draft to replace Bettis. Well, Jacobs ain't jolly and he's also ten feet tall, which means that he's also not built like a bowling ball. Sure, the two running backs both push about 260, but Jacobs is a lean 260, isn't as nimble, somehow, and runs a lot higher. There are some that say he's easy to take down and he doesn't run as big as he is. These people (Cleveland Browns) are retarded. Jacobs may not be Bettis, but he does have one very important thing going for him: He's young. Remember when Bettis was young? Well, maybe you don't. But, when Bettis was young, he was better than Jacobs. I'd take Jacobs 2006 over Bettis 2006, though, simply because of mileage.
5. The Giants lost two of their best defensive ends in the offseason, one to injury, one to retirement... and they haven't missed a beat. They have 21 sacks, which is second best in the NFL.
6. Who's the best with 25 sacks? So glad you asked. Why, it's your Pittsburgh Steelers! (Takes a page out of the Obama playbook) Look. James Harrison and LaMarr Woodley have 16 of those sacks. The Giants tackles are the weak point of their line. If we can somehow force Eli to throw a lot, this game is over. Remember what I said about turtling? Well, it'll happen. In order for it to happen, we'll need to score a bunch of points early.
7. To score a bunch of points early, we'll need to throw the ball. Did I mention that our offensive line sucks and their defensive line is awesome? Well, they also like to blitz a lot. If Santonio or Ward can beat their man off the line and Ben makes the right read, we can get some long gains. If that happens, there's your bunch of scoring early.
8. If not, we're kinda boned. Usually, teams with defensive lines that are good at getting to the quarterback are small, so they're easy to run on. Not so with this defensive line. They're crazy. They're all over the place. My theory is that they run back and forth real fast, like Quicksilver, and they're able to co-locate. Still working on data to back that up. If Fast Willie comes back, he's probably not 100%. But, Tomlin will still keep feeding him the ball, because that's what he does.
9. Remember when I said that Fast Willie eats teams alive that have bad defensive lines and slow linebackers? I said it in the Bengals Preview. Well, whatever. That's not the case with the Giants. They have a great defensive line and fast linebackers. So, we're boned. I'm not suddenly converting into a Mewelde Moore fan. I seriously believe that Willie gives us the best chance to win. However, it'd probably be good if he gets 15 carries.
10. Everyone likes to knock the Giants secondary, because it's obviously not possible for them to have a great front seven and a great secondary in this age of free agency and parity. Well, they're not great, but I find it hard to knock a unit that's part of a 5-1 team and happened to shut down the receivers for the Cowboys, Packers, and Patriots in consecutive weeks when there was no next game to make it up. Hey, it's possible that we can beat them with our receivers. It's possible that we can get behind them and hit a big play. It's possible that someone can catch a slant, make a guy miss, and go 80 yards for a score. As I've said, all things are possible through Jesus. But... maybe not so much on Sunday. (Dodges lightning bolt.) By that I meant this coming Sunday, not Sundays in general. Yeesh.
11. Speaking of secondaries, because we focused so much energy on our front seven, our secondary kinda sucks. And, now Bryant McFadden -- a favorite in this space -- is hurt. So, we're back to Ike "Ball Bitch" Taylor and Deshea Townsend. Granted, the Ball Bitch matches up pretty well against Plaxico, but Eli has this knack for finding guys in big moments that you had never friggin' heard of previously. Maybe he'll be so busy turtling that he won't. But, that's a big maybe.
12. Didja see that Max Starks started for Marvel Smith last week? Well, still, unless he starts every game at left tackle for the rest of the season, the Steelers pissed away $7 million. And, if Smith is healthy, or even Smith is 75%, he's still beating out Starks. So, I'd still like to see him in sweats. And I'm really not looking forward to him facing off against Justin Tuck. I think he's going to get destroyed and we'll need to keep five guys back there to help him.
13. And... I made the mistake of writing half of this last night and half of this this morning. Santonio got busted for weed possession and I found out about it from Weidman on the drive in. I don't think that Kaiser Goodell is going to hand down a suspension by game time, but, needless to say, Santonio's gonna be... distracted.
14. The tackles for the Giants offensive line may suck (okay, they don't suck, they're average, or about as good as, say, Willie Colon and Max Starks), but the two guards and the center for them are very, very good. And, since they tend to run between the tackles and not behind them, that's not so good for the Steelers. Center Shaun O'Hara reminds me of Jeff Hartings, only with two good knees. Guard Chris Snee is head coach Tom Coughlin's son-in-law. Now, there are careers where it makes a lot of sense to be married to the boss' daughter, because it means that you can cock off and no one will say anything. Like fiance, where you'll probably get the best lists, so it'll be easy to hit your numbers and, if you take in nine holes of golf, you could always be "out with an important client". Football's not really like that. Since the media has so much access, you can't play favorites (probably should be a little harder on your son-in-law so there's not even rumors about playing favorites), the coach can easily replace you for any reason and everyone, down to some dude that just has to do a Google search knows how much you make. So, he's got to worry about his on-the-field and off-the-field performance and the fact that "Dad" controls his life. At this point (he was drafted in 2004), he's gotta be pretty strung out, terrified, and set himself up so that he absolutely, positively cannot fail. If nothing else, he needs to do a good job so that he won't come home to, "Daddy says you blew a block in the third quarter and Eli got sacked. I love Eli and his wife. Why are you trying to get him hurt? Daddy thinks it's because you're unbalanced." Pretty much, he's gotta be perfect, and he's doing a damn fine job so far.
15. Casey Hampton is back. That. Is. Friggin'. Huge. And so is he. So, it's gonna be tough for Shaun O'Hara and Pauly Shore to move him off the ball.
16. But, really, even with Big Snack and Keisel back, I think they're going to be able to run the ball. The one thing that gives me hope is that, somehow, James Farrior suddenly gets three years younger and Tomlin finally puts Timmons in full time. But, since the odds of that are as good as the odds of Snee giving his wife anal, for fear she'll tell Daddy, I think I'm just gonna move on.

This one's a lot like the Eagles game. I really think it could go either way and the Giants are a great team that matches up well against us.

So, I'm gonna do what I did in the Eagles game and pick the home team.

Prediciton:

Steelers 24, Giants 20

Steeler vs. Bengals Review

Hey, we won. We won big. We're now 5-1 and, with the schedule we have coming up, we need every win we can get.

I'm glad that this game was a victory for the black and gold. I'm glad that I pretty much predicted how it would go down -- that the Bengals would hang around for a while, then slowly start to fade away until they eventually succumbed to the will of the Might Steelers.

The trouble is that there's really nothing you can take away from this game to hang your hat on. We ran the ball well, but that was pretty much because the Bengals run defense is horrible. Ben had a good day throwing the ball, but that was more as a result of Cincinnati's suckitude than our awesomeness.

We didn't allow a sack, but I think that was more a by-product of the fact that the Bengals can't rush the quarterback and they have, like, five sacks total this year. We had seven sacks on defense, but the Cincinnati offensive line licks the sweat off a dead man's balls.

So, really, what did we learn? We learned that the Bengals are bad, the Steelers are good, and that we won on Sunday to push the season record to 5-1. Seriously, that's good enough for me. We need to take the wins where we can get them.

Three of the next four games on the schedule are at home, but we play the Giants (in Pittsburgh), then the Redskins (at DC), then the Colts and Chargers at home. Even if the two AFC teams on that list are out of synch and possibly heading for hugely disappointing seasons, anything can happen in the three weeks between now and when we play them.

Both teams have a ton of talent and might suddenly say, "Hey, wait a second! We're really good at this football thing! How about we start acting like it?" And then they could go on a run where they thrash the shit out of whoever they play for six or seven weeks straight.

Of course, they could continue to spiral, lose their way, and be running on fumes and depression by Week 10. You never know. Which is why it would be good if we kept winning games. The more games we win and the more games they lose, the more it's going to seem to them -- and us, and the rest of the league -- that we're separating from them and they have no prayer of beating us.

They'll still try (and they may come close, because they are talented teams, after all) , but they'll fail because their lack of faith in themselves will not allow them to succeed.

It's a weird dynamic, but it's going to be more important to follow what the Chargers and Colts do to hurt or help themselves in the next few weeks than it will be to track the progress of the Steelers.

And, who knows, both teams will still have enough time left to save their respective seasons (unless they totally implode) by the time they play us, so they might have their backs against the wall the game where they play us.

Fear and desperation are excellent motivating factors and tend to make football players better. So is confidence. Right now, the Steelers are playing with a lot of confidence. Hopefully, that continues. Hopefully, the confidence will be beaten out of our future opponents by the time we face them -- Dallas, I'm looking at you -- and we might actually come out of this season with one of the easier schedules of all time when it's all said and done.

Then again, we still have to play the defending champs, the hated Ravens, and the Tennessee Titans before the end of the season, so it's probably too early to have that discussion.

16 Reasons the Bengals Make Me Poop My Pants

For real? For serious? I have to say that the Bengals don't make me poop my pants. History makes me poop my pants. And not history like the Defenestration of Prague or the Mighty Shit Uprising of Lictenstein, but Steelers history.

1. Remember when the Steelers were the team to beat in the division and the Bengals were sucking big, fat balls? Well, it happend about 487 times during the Cowher Era and, according to statistics, the Steelers ended up losing 463 of those contests. Maybe I should check my facts on that, but I do know that the Bengals went 3-13 one year, but still swept us. Yes. We accounted for a full two thirds of Bengals victories that year.
2. What's that? Cowher retired in 2006? How about this for evidence of playing to the level of our competition during the Tomlin Era. Or, possibly, this. And maybe this.
   
3. TJ Houshmanzadeh is the Carl Pickens of this era. We've successfully shut down Chad Buenos Noches, or whatever the hell his name is now, over the course of his career. Most of the credit for that goes to kickoff-ball-bitch Ike Taylor, who will be covering Cinco de Mayo on Sunday. And gracias El Senor for that. But, Housh has downright destroyed us throughout his career, no matter how crappy the Bengals were at the time.
   
4. Even after the bye week, Fast Willie is doubtful for this game. That sucks, because he usually destroys teams with bad defensive lines and slow linebackers like the Bengals.
   
5. Even after the bye week, Casey Hampton is probably not going to be back.
6. At least Brett Keisel is back. I mean, he's right on schedule and the other two guys have real, male injuries like knees and groins, but Diesel just hurt his calf. So, I'm glad he's back.
7. Ben had a chance to rest his various, nagging injuries. So that's good. Glad he might finally be over that strained vagina.
8. The actual good news is that, since Willie is going to be out again and we have Mewelde Moore, the Closet Pooper, and Gary Russell, that means we're going to throw a lot. And, well, even though the Bengals have some crappy defensive linemen and slow linebackers, they also have a pretty crappy secondary. Plus which, we could probably put Aaron Smith in at tailback and have him gain 80 yards, so it's good that we won't have to lean too much on the run and probably won't have to lean too much on the pass. We might *gasp* actually have a balanced attack. Granted it will have happened by force and by injury, but it's never a bad thing to run a balanced offense.
9. Cincinnati let Rudi Johnson go because they thought he was used up and wasn't really going to do anything for them at any point in the future. When they did that, they pinned their hopes on Chris Perry. Chris Perry sucks major balls. Now, the Steelers have themselves a great run defense -- even without Hampton and it's going to get better with Keisel in there -- but the Bengals have made some pretty dismal run defenses look pretty damn good thus far this season. So, Perry's not going to be too much of a factor.
10. Anyone who can't beat out Suck Ass Perry for a job probably isn't worth a damn, either, so that means that we don't have to fear the likes of De De Dorsey or Kenny Watson coming out of nowhere and destroying us.
11. We also shouldn't worry too much about Ryan Fitzpatrick, who will be starting because Cornhole Champion Carson Palmer will be resting his sore elbow. He probably hurt it cornholing too much. To say that Fitzpatrick has looked fucking terrible thus far is an insult to both the word fucking and the word terrible. He has not been worth six ounces of dog shit to this point, so the Steelers shouldn't fear him.
12. Santonio Holmes is to the Bengals what Carl Pickens and Housh have been to the Steelers. He's had big games in Cincinnati and I think he has another one on Sunday.
13. Hines Ward has also been a Bengal killer, so look for him to steal a touchdown from Heath Miller and my fantasy team in the red zone. At least one. When he's not getting fine. Friggin' bureaucrats.
14. I have officially decided that Marvin Lewis is a bad coach. He doesn't manage the game well, takes timeouts at the wrong points, and has, at different points splintered his locker room by saying that Chris Henry wasn't welcome on the team and splintered the locker room when he welcomed Henry back after the owners said he had to. It looked for a while as though he was the man responsible for turning around the most inept, dysfunctional franchise in the NFL (yes, worse than Detroit and Steelers West), but it turns out that they really just had one good year and a couple years where they went 8-8. So, really, the've only had one non-losing season since they lost the Super Bowl in, like, 1743. It's been a while, however long ago it was.
15. The home crowd has lost their faith in the team and a number of season ticket holders have put their seats up on StubHub and eBay. So, unless some miracle shit happens, it's not like the crowd is going to rally around them and carry them through in the fourth quarter. More than likely, everyone will look like the old dude in a commercial about irregular bladders or diarrhea.
    
16. Seriously, if the Steelers lose this one, then they don't belong in the conversation of elite NFL teams. They got in that conversation with gutsy wins over the hated Ravens and Jaguars, then had the good fortune to draw their bye week at a time when upsets were more common than losing football teams in Ohio. They can't lose to a team that's as shitty as the Bengals and still think they're any good. It just can't happen.

Like I said, history makes me poop my pants in this one, not the team the Steelers are playing on Sunday.

The Bengals are going to be pissed off, the fans are going to be into it in the first quarter, and we'll probably have to withstand an initial burst of enthusiasm and optimism. But, ultimately, they can't hit us hard enough to make us go down for the count.

I don't think this team has the talent, the heart, or the coaching to pull off an upset. I'm going to look like a total asshole on Monday for saying that, but I believe it to be true.

Prediction:

Steelers 35, Bengals 13

Steelers vs. Jaguars Review

I have to say that, even though I thought we were going to win this game coming into it, I wasn't sure that we could.

We were down to our fourth string tailback, we were playing Jacksonville, who has owned us of late, we were playing in Jacksonville, where we suck, we had two defensive linemen out, we were beat up in other areas, and the hated Ravens left us broken and bloodied, after we escaped that Monday night game with a win.

Still won. I don't mean to harp on this "turning point" thing (well, maybe I do), but that Monday night game really seems like it's turning into one.

We had five really, really tough games, we overcame all the stuff we overcame in that game (which included some pretty crappy officiating), and we're sitting at 4-1, going into a bye week.

It's always good to get a week off -- well, unless you're a fan, then you have to figure out what to do on a Sunday -- but I think this bye week comes just at the right time. Willie can get healthy, Casey Hampton can get healthy, Roethlisberger can rest his strained vagina, Jeff Reed can get healthy (bad times if he gets hurt: I dropped a receiver so I could keep him on my fantasy team and I never, ever drop a skill guy to keep a kicker or a defense), Brett Keisel can get healthy, and we can work on the fact that the offensive line still kinda sucks big balls.

And, okay, I made the vagina remark, but we don't win that game without Big Ben. We don't even win that game with David Garrard, and I think Garrard's a hell of a quarterback. This will not end up being as great a year for Roethlisberger statistically, but it sure as hell is his best year yet. He's taking the team on his shoulders. He's taking responsibility. And he's made a hell of a lot of great plays that no other quarterback in the league could make. I have to say I'm pleased.

I can't complain too much and I really don't think there's much cause for pessimism at this point. And.. I may have just jinxed it.

So, before this turns into a stroke fest, three things we need to work on over the bye week.

1. I mentioned the offensive line sucks big balls, right? We covered that? Well, they suck big balls. Although I have to say that I was very impressed that Mewelde Moore ran for almost 100 yards against a great Jaguars run defense. And I was happy to see that DFS played well. And, did you see that Max Starks was in for three whole plays? Fuck that guy. Make him inactive each week. Please. Put him in the Duce Staley sweats and have him donate half his salary to Weidman. Pretty please.
2. In case you hadn't noticed, we haven't had even a decent return game since Randle-El left. I don't mean to be an alarmist, but that means it's been over two years. The last time we had a decent return game, the mortgage industry and Wall Street were respected and run by hard-working individuals and Miley Cyrus was just the awkward daughter of the dude with the mullet who sang Achy, Breaky Heart.
3. So, at some point, people are going to figure out that LaMarr Woodley and James Harrison are really, really friggin' good. Before that happens and offenses successfully scheme up ways to slow them down, do you think we could design some inside blitzes around Lawrence Timmons, Larry Foote, and the venerable James Farrior. This is a concern. Seriously. Keep Starks active and give the sweats to Gary Russell. Dick LeBeau, if you can read this, just fix it.
   

16 Reasons the Jaguars Make Me Poop My Pants

Yeah. A Monday night game, then a Sunday night game. We get to watch Hank Williams, Jr. tear it up one week, then watch Faith Hill mail it in the next. Then we get to watch the Steelers, so it's not all bad.

1. So, everyone knows that Willie's hurt, Mendenhall's on IR, Davis is hurt, and we have some combination of Mewelde Moore, Najeh, and Gary Russell for this game, right? Everyone's aware of that? Just want to make sure. Because, ya know, it sucks and all.
2. Games against the hated Ravens always end with injuries and the team being tired as hell the next week. Games against Jacksonville always end with injuries and the team being tired as hell the next week. We got them back-to-back. That's awesome. The good news is that, if we live through this game, there won't be another shitty two game stretch like this for the rest of the season.
3. The bad news, of course, is that everyone should be dead by halftime.
4. Looks like DFS will line up at right guard in place of Kendall Simmons. And Willie Colon will be at right tackle. And Max Starks and his $7 million salary will be chilling on the bench, drinking Gatorade. And that blows. DFS will have had an entire week of practice and should know where to go and what to do. Although I like Simmons, I never thought that he was ever that fantastic of a right guard, so I don't think that the injury will affect the offensive line too much. Really, I'm just upset that Starks isn't good enough to land a starting spot on a wounded line.
5. The Jaguars traded Marcus Stroud in the offseason, so the interior of the defensive line isn't as tough as it once was, but John Henderson, who runs about 7' and 820 pounds, still takes up a lot of space and is very good. Not that we have ever run the ball well against the Jaguars, but the one advantage we had, at least recently, was that Willie was fast enough to get to the edge and go around all those big dudes in the middle. With the cast of characters we have now? Not so much.
6. Where Jacksonville has some pretty big holes is in the secondary. They have a bunch of guys that are good -- Rashean Mathis might actually even be great -- but no one that consistently cover Hines and Santonio, to say nothing of the fact that, at some point before I die, the Steelers will get Heath involved in the passing game.
7. I think we're reaching a critical point in Ben Roethlisberger's development. He had a major breakthrough against the hated Ravens, was more vocal than he's ever been, and the Steelers came back and won. With a big time quarterback and a big time kicker, as I mentioned, we can do a lot of damage. That Monday night game could be a turning point for the entire franchise -- not just this season, but for the rest of Ben's career -- or it could be just another game where we overcame a ten point deficit at halftime and ended up winning the game in overtime. Only one way to be sure.
8. The Jaguars run defense makes me poop my pants. They're very, very good. Add to that the fact that we're pulling people out of the stands to play tailback and DFS is now our starting right guard, and the odds are not good that we'll be able to run the ball at all. We seriously could end up with 18 carries for 14 yards, or something crazy like that. So, armed with that knowledge, then also considering that the Jacksonville secondary is just okay, we need to put this game in Ben's hands. And, I'm not talking something moderate like, "We should throw more than usual." I'm talking about lining up with three wide receivers and Heath, keeping Moore in at tailback (he's a third down guy, right? So, just pretend like it's always third down), and just running a no-huddle offense all game. Getting Ben 35 or 40 pass attempts. Maybe running some draws out of the shotgun. If we're going to throw the ball, we need to commit. If we run the ball into the line again and again, we're just going to get beat up. This team, as it stands, is just not physical enough to match the Jags defense blow-for-blow, so we really shouldn't even try. It will then be up to the defense to establish a physical presence.
9. You can't beat the Jaguars by prancing around and relying on skill. They'll walk up to you, kick you in the stones, and say, "Pirouette your way out of that, you little sissy boy." You can beat them if you're willing to go toe-to-toe with them in one phase of the game, though.
10. Jacksonville has had a lot of injuries on the offensive line, too. As a matter of fact, both their guards and their center have yet to play this season. They've adjusted, but they don't have their A-game guys in there. They squeaked by the Colts and the Texans, but they really haven't had a great game yet. In order to make sure that Sunday night's game isn't their first great game of the season, we need to attack those three guys in the middle and make a point to make them pay.
11. Maurice Jones-Drew and Fred Taylor are both really, really good. Even though Jones-Drew is about three feet shorter than Taylor, they're pretty much interchangable. Jacksonville throws to Jones-Drew more than they throw to Taylor, and they'll run Taylor inside more than they'll run Jones-Drew inside, but that's about it as far as differences are concerned. The one thing both guys need is room to run. The one place where they both run well is inside. So, now would be a good time to remind everyone that their three interior linemen are replacement players. Again, need to take advantage of that. If their scrubs can push us around, it's going to be a loooooooong night.
12. David Garrard isn't as fast as Michael Vick, but he's a big, powerful dude. He showed that in last year's playoff game. He showed that he can be an accurate passer and he showed that he can run right over or right around someone if he needs to. The best way to contain him is to pressure him. If you attack him on the edges, he's going to stiff arm the little dude that's coming at him, then run up the middle for 15 yards and a first down. The one place you can pressure him is right up the middle. He doesn't go east-to-west very well and doesn't throw well on the run. And, people that blitz up the middle are usually bigger guys that Garrard can't just push out of the way. So... I did mention that there are three new starters on the offensive line... right?
13. Jerry Porter has come back and Matt Jones is starting to be less crappy but, in general, their receivers are pretty terrible. If you want to play a pick-up basketball game, these are your guys, because they're all big and tall. They just don't seem to be very good football players. They don't fight for the ball, they don't run great routes, and they actually aren't that great at catching the ball.
14. The one thing they do do well, though, is run the slant. They ran about 128 of those against Houston and completed almost all of them. Their guys are so big that can jam the cornerback, turn their shoulder, and completely box the defender out, catching the ball and falling forward for about 8 or 9 yards. The way you stop that is by hitting these dudes hard, playing close to the line of scrimmage, and dropping your linebackers into the area of the field between the quarterback and the receiver. If enough of those slant passes get knocked down or intercepted, I have a feeling they'll stop throwing them.
15. Problem is, when you gear up to stop the slant, you leave yourself open to the deep ball. That's why they need to have Ryan Clark play center field and basically keep these big fuckers in front of him. That leaves Troy free to prowl around and get into adventures.
16. Ben's the x-factor on offense and Troy's going to need to be the x-factor on defense. We need to blitz him, we need to put him in the box in run support, we need to move him all over the field and make sure that the Jaguars have to keep tabs on him at all times. If they're overly concerned with him, they'll miss the other guys that we have on defense that can ruin their day. Guys like LaMarr Woodley and James Harrison. Guys like Timmons and Aaron Smith. I really think Troy's back to his 2005 form, so we need to make sure that we use him just like we used him back then. It worked out pretty well for that LeBeau-coached defense and it will work out well for this one.

It's going to take a big effort from everyone involved and it's definitely not going to be easy. In order to win, the Steelers are going to need to do things that are waaaaay outside their comfort zone. If they can do those things, though, I really think they can win.

We have sucked giant donkey balls in Jacksonville (and, really, against Jacksonville) the past five years or so, but I think that, with the new era starting and the turning point having already been established, we can get off the schneid and beat the Jaguars.

Prediciton:

Steelers 21, Jaguars 13