Is there reason for concern for the upcoming 2014 season?

So we've seen 4 preview games, more like 3 as the starters barely touched the field last night in the Steelers pre-season finally. Last night's game was more of an audition for players on the bubble to get noticed by other teams.

So let's reflect.

Offensively, the Steelers still have a lot of work to be done, and a short time frame to get it done. However, I believe there's hope in this bunch. It's difficult to tell how the 1st unit is geling when they're only playing a few series and barely given the normal time restraints of a full game. Yes, I'm not happy with the team's performance against the Eagles, but I'm still encouraged. I can't explain. Maybe it's just the fact that I'm always optimistic when it comes to the Steelers (at least until they are mathematically 100% eliminated from playoffs).

Defensively, I feel that Dick LeBeau will have the unit playing at 2005/2008 levels. When we were feared across the league. The infusion of youth will help solidify some weak spots while others will certainly have to stand against the furnace until the front office drafts the individuals responsible for filling those spots.

STs!? Ugh, I've hated our special teams more years than not. I feel they've always been the weak link to our survival. Punters don't know how to coffin kick, kickers can't get it through the endzone for a touch back, and coverage always seems to be a shot in the dark. Anyone remember the last time our STs wasn't in question? I think I may have been a pre-teen, but I'm not certain. I do remember in '05 when we had Chundi (I believe that was the guy - if not, someone will correct me) as a STs player by heart and he was the leader of our kickoff coverage and boy was he passionate about knocking people down. I wish we had that element on our squad again.

But the question remains are YOU more concerned about the 2014 regular season or are you feeling good about the Steelers?

YES, I am very concerned. Our first team defense could not stop Derek Anderson and the Panthers 2nd string offense from driving down the field last night...that's a problem. Our offense has not done anything beyond vanilla screen tosses and short middle routes. The running game was supposed to be prolific...haven't seen it. Receivers aren't giving me a load of confidence with the amount of drops, I'm hoping Todd Haley has more to offer...

I was feeling good this offseason and really liked what I had seen from Shazier in game 2, but now my red flags are up especially after the Philly game where we looked COMPLETELY outmatched starters VS starters.

Concerned? Yes. Giving up that they will have a winning season this year? No.

I don't think the defense will be feared by anyone but the offense has the POTENTIAL to be a dominate force. Am I worried based on a few preseason games? Nope.

Will I be worried if we start 0-4 or 1-3? Yep.

I was actually feeling really good until the Philly game. I mean, they just plowed over us.

If we can beat the Panthers and Ravens in the first couple of weeks, then I think we will gain momentum and be ok.

Is it too soon to break this out?






EDIT: Ginger didn't even bother putting it away. She probably still has her Christmas lights up from last year.


Offense

I'm not concerned at all about the offense. I still think Ben is going to have his best season, and our offense is going to be dynamic. What we saw in the preseason in no way reflects what we're going to see in the regular season. As was pointed out after the Eagles game, the game plan was for Ben to work on his connection with Wheaton. That's why there were so many forced passes to him and why Ben didn't even look A. Brown's way in the first half. The plan wasn't to score points and win the game ... the plan was to work on certain areas ... it was a glorified practice. Also, they were running a very vanilla offense. We need to keep all that in mind before we start "Fire Haley" and "Fire Tomlin" threads.

Defense

Unlike the offense, I do have some concerns about the defense. In my opinion, the biggest factors will be Jones and Worilds. If they can apply pressure, our defense will be fine. If they can't, then it's going to be a long season (or a short season, depending on how you look at it). One thing to keep in mind is the youth and inexperience we now have on the defense. Our entire D-line is young. Jones is in his second season. Worilds has been around, but this is his first season as a starter on Day 1 and only his second season of playing a significant role. Cortez has also been around, but this is only his second season as a starter. And then we have the rookie Shazier.

With all that youth and inexperience, did everyone really expect the defense to come out looking like the Steel Curtain of the 70s? It's going to take some time for everything to come together. The offense will have to carry the defense for a while, so I'm not going to panic if the defense struggles early in the season. I'll be more concerned if the defense is still struggling after game 8 or 9.

The Bottom Line

We've made changes and added some youth and inexperience, mostly on the defense, and it's going to take some time for things to gel. There's no way of knowing how long that will take, but it will happen. For now, we need to be patient and have some trust in the coaches.

Wally left out special teams. My hunch is that they make him nervous and he wouldn't trust Suisham to make a game winning kick....

I agree that the offense will be fine. We have a lot of weapons and if BR7 has time, he knows how to use them.

Our defense scares the living snot out of me.

SteelersYak wrote:

Wally left out special teams.  My hunch is that they make him nervous and he wouldn't trust Suisham to make a game winning kick....

I purposely left it out because I figured my opinion was a given.

Wallace108 wrote:

SteelersYak wrote:

Wally left out special teams.  My hunch is that they make him nervous and he wouldn't trust Suisham to make a game winning kick....

I purposely left it out because I figured my opinion was a given.

Wally's opinion about STs is about as accurate as my opinion on this threat of running the no-huddle. That and the lost art form known as the COFFIN KICK for Punters.

Some people are hard to figure out. Truck isn't one of them. If you want to make Truck happy, just give him these 3 things:

1. No huddle
2. Coffin kick
3. Fullback

So the ultimate for truck would be a 4th down on the 45 where the special teams comes out in no huddle and the fullback kicks a coffin kick.....

SteelersYak wrote:

So the ultimate for truck would be a 4th down on the 45 where the special teams comes out in no huddle and the fullback kicks a coffin kick.....

Truck would lose his mind if that happened.

Wally,

The spirit of the Chief, like Christmas, lives with me every day of the year!

On a scale of 1 (not worried) to 10 (very worried), I would say I'm at a 4. The defense is what worries me more. To break it down, I feel about a 2 on the offense and a 7 about the defense.

SteelersYak wrote:

On a scale of 1 (not worried) to 10 (very worried), I would say I'm at a 4.  The defense is what worries me more.  To break it down, I feel about a 2 on the offense and a 7 about the defense.

That sounds about right. I can't disagree with that thinking.

Wallace108 wrote:

Some people are hard to figure out. Truck isn't one of them. If you want to make Truck happy, just give him these 3 things:

1. No huddle
2. Coffin kick
3. Fullback

so true

SteelersYak wrote:

So the ultimate for truck would be a 4th down on the 45 where the special teams comes out in no huddle and the fullback kicks a coffin kick.....

Hell Yeah!!!!!!

Good times for all!!!!

Wallace108 wrote:

SteelersYak wrote:

So the ultimate for truck would be a 4th down on the 45 where the special teams comes out in no huddle and the fullback kicks a coffin kick.....

Truck would lose his mind if that happened.

I'd probably be more like this:

Holy shit with the coffin kick...LOL.

Sorry Drizz, it's just an artform that has passed by the Steelers organization and one that could help us win games.

The problem is, we have guys like Wing who are struggling to kick the ball 35+ yards, so they are more concerned about kicking the ball further downfield than angling it towards the sidelines. Also, for the coffin kick to be effective, it is used 99% of the time to pin opponents behind their 20 yard line. A lot of the times, our offense doesn't get far enough with the aforementioned 35+ yard struggles of the above kicker to make that feasible.

touché Drizz