Three Quick Reactions to the Steelers’ First Round Draft Day

photo via Steelers.com

I said yesterday I wasn’t going to write any more about the draft until we came back from our anniversary trip, but we don’t leave until tomorrow, and I just have to take a few minutes out from packing and such to comment on last night.

What a day for Pittsburgh sports! The Penguins beat the Capitals in the first game of the second round, in Washington, but considering that Washington has been their traditional second-round opponent every time they’ve won the cup, perhaps it isn’t surprising. It is a bit more surprising that they did it without Carl Hagelin and Evgeni Malkin, but there you are.

Then comes the news that Jung Ho Gung, the Korean player the Pirates had presumably given up on ever seeing again, finally got a visa. It’s been a year and a half, at least. There are plenty who would say the Pirates should turn their back on him, and there’s no doubt he screwed up royally. Nor does anyone know whether he’s still good at baseball. But I’m hoping this is the chance he needs to turn his life around. How quick we are as a society to turn on celebrities. Perhaps it makes us feel better about ourselves. I’m personally a big fan of second (or in his case, rather more than second) chances. It’s certainly his last one.

And speaking of second (and third) chances, the thing that Kevin Colbert swore wasn’t going to happen happened yesterday—the Steelers traded Martavis Bryant to the Raiders for a third-round pick. I think it is excellent for everyone. The Steelers get a pick back for the fourth-rounder they traded to the 49ers for Vance McDonald, but a much better one—middle of the 3rd round. They can pick up another big receiver, probably in the 2nd or 3rd round, and hopefully everyone is happy. Bryant gets a fresh start and the Steelers get to move on from a question mark.

After all, there are three possible scenarios for this coming season with Bryant on the roster. 1) He has a monster season and then parlays that into a huge contract with another team. Great for 2018, not so great ongoing. 2) He has an up-and-down season like last year and frustrates everyone, including himself, because he stops getting “mines.” Bad for the team, bad for the locker room, I’m guessing. Or the worst scenario—3) he isn’t doing well or getting enough balls, gets depressed, smokes some weed, and bang, he’s out of football, maybe forever. I’m guessing he’ll be a focus of the offense in Oakland, at least unless he proves himself unworthy of it, and he can blossom. Hopefully he won’t do so the week we have to play the Raiders, in Oakland, but that’s the breaks…

And then there was the surprise announcer of the Steelers’ pick. Ryan Shazier walked to the podium with his fiancee to make the pick. If you haven’t seen the video, check it out. It’s front and center on Steelers.com. If you can watch it and not tear up, you’re a hard-hearted person, is all I can say.

And of course many are tearing up, in a different sense, over the pick itself. It absolutely came out of nowhere—rather like the Ryan Shazier pick, actually. But even more so. Most don’t have anything against Terrell Edmunds, only that they felt he should have been taken in the third round. The Steelers, obviously, didn’t feel that way, nor, apparently, did they feel comfortable trading down and taking a chance on him being gone. (Or perhaps they couldn’t find any trade partners.)

I’ve read a bit of the analysis, and here’s what stood out to me:

Edmunds is a hybrid safety who can play at the line of scrimmage and can play some man coverage.

He is in the super high character mold of recent drafts. The man he and his brother Trumaine (who was taken by the Bills at Pick 16,) trained with the same guy, and according to Mike Mayock said that the two young men were the politest and nicest young men he’d ever worked with. With any luck this means that Edmunds will say “I’m sorry” when he’s forced to snatch a ball away from an opposing receiver.

Because yes, he has ball skills. Not so much last year as in 2016. But it turns out there’s a reason—he was playing with an injured shoulder for the whole season, until he finally had to give up and have the surgery. Kevin Colbert said they were impressed by this, and I assume they are thinking his 2016 tape is more realistic, assuming Edmunds is healthy.

And this also demonstrates his commitment to the team—that he would continue to play, knowing he couldn’t play as well, and that it was going to hurt his draft stock.

And finally, he was responsible for lining up the defense, and apparently was very good at it. His plus communication skills were undoubtedly one of the things that attracted Tomlin and Colbert to him.

Well, there’s no telling whether he will turn out to be a Jarvis Jones or a (hopefully luckier) Ryan Shazier. You could pretty much say that about anybody they took. But hopefully a similar scenario will play out to Shazier’s draft year, in that many thought the Steelers might take Stephon Tuitt in the first round and were outraged at the pick. And instead the Steelers got both men*. I’m hopeful that someone they had highly graded will fall to them in the second round.

We will see. In the meantime, it’s going to be hard to top last night, in terms of sheer Pittsburgh sports drama.

And now I really am shutting this down. Unless, of course, the Steelers’ next three picks all come from my mock drafts. Who knows what I would do then?

*They still have Shazier. He of course will not be able to play this season. And very possibly not ever. Coming back from an injury like that when you’re a player whose game is predicated on blazing speed is extremely difficult, in terms of whether you can ever be the same player. One can’t help but think of Sean Spence. If I were Shazier’s fiancee I would be praying every chance I got that he never walks onto another football field, at least in a uniform. But watching his indomitable spirit is inspiring for everyone, and the Steelers seem determined to involve and utilize him as much as possible.

Tackling the Big Questions, No. 1: To Keep or Not to Keep

Photo via Steelers.com, illustrating some of those intangibles…

I’m launching another new offseason feature this year, because as Kevin Colbert said in his recent press conference, if you keep doing the same thing, why would you expect a different result? (Although why we would want a different result than a 13-3 season and winning the division was not stated, except, I suppose, for that little “first-round playoff exit” thing…)

And I don’t know what different result I’m aiming for, either. Truth to tell, I just like the sound of the headline, and you’re going to see it a lot, exploring different issues. Today’s issue, as you might suspect, is the potential free agents whose status is still very much up in the air at the moment.

Congratulations – Pittsburgh Has Already Won

via hockeybeasts.com

by Ivan Cole

Usually, my writing is directed to Steeler Nation as a whole, but there is at least one way that the community can be partitioned. There are Pittsburgh fans, and then there are Steelers fans. The common denominator for these two groups is the allegiance and devotion to the Steelers.

Pittsburgh fans are most commonly natives, emigres and expats who are committed to the totality of the Pittsburgh sports culture. Beyond the football team, Steelers fans may be more eclectic, with loyalties that reflect the diversity of their backgrounds. It is a principle desire of a sports fan to realize a championship experience. Indeed, one of the key reasons for the existence of such a robust base of Steelers fans who are not tethered to geographic loyalty. This is based upon the past satisfaction of that desire, (Pittsburgh fans will stick with the team regardless of performance) and a reasonable expectation that it will be fulfilled again.

5 Smoldering Questions on the Dan Rooney and the 2017 Draft

From lovable losers to Super Bowl champions

The 2017 off season has been an eventful one as Steelers Nation said good bye to Dan Rooney while welcoming the 2017 NFL Draft class. And while the “real” off season will begin soon (you know, the dead period where it gets hard to find, much less make, news articles), there’s still plenty of material here for us to wrestle with these 5 Smoldering Questions on Dan Rooney and the Draft.

A Long Lingering Look at the Steelers’ First Round Draft Pick

via Steelers.om

How can I help taking a long lingering look? The Steelers, to Momma’s tremendous excitement, picked her No. 1 BLA choice for the first round, T. J. Watt..

Fortunately for me, Momma, and the Steelers, Watt is more than a pretty face. A lot more. I may joke around about the “Best-Looking Player Available,” but what I really love is a high character guy. And if he is also chock full of football smarts, why would you hesitate?

There’s a lot of talk today about the players the Steelers passed up, most notably Reuben Foster. But given the difficulties they’ve encountered recently, how on earth could they take a chance on a guy with a failed drug test – at the Combine?

Actually, I’ll tell you how they could do that, because they actually did about five years ago. You all remember the story, I’m sure. Mike Adams from Ohio State was well up their draft board, by all accounts, although no one ever knows for sure. Then he failed the combine drug test, and came right off the board, until Adams drove to Pittsburgh, basically demanded an interview, and begged for another chance. They gave it to him. And I’m sorry to say it didn’t turn out well.. I don’t know about y’all, but I would be rather hesitant to dive into those waters once again.

5 Smoldering Questions: the 2016 Finale

by Hombre de Acero

The 2016 NFL seasons has come to its end and, as much as we might not like it, the New England Patriots are 5-time Super Bowl Champions. Many if not most Steelers sites have long since shut the book on the Steelers 2016 campaign, but in keeping with this site’s commitment to offer an introspective view of the Steelers, we take one last Smoldering look at 2016 before shifting to the off season and free agency.

1. Shortly after our last edition of the 5 Smolderings, I was commiserating with a Dallas Cowboy fan who observed this:

“As much of a disappointment it is to lose in a Championship Game, it still can’t replicate the pain of that Divisional Round loss after twice tying the game in the 4th quarter; it’s still going to take a long while until I am over that game.”

The Steelers have had their share of heartbreaking AFC Championship game losses. Would it have been easier for you as a fan to swallow this loss had it gone down to the wire? More importantly, do you think the lopsided nature of the loss will have negative repercussions moving forward?

Fifth Quarter Report: 2016 Pittsburgh Steelers, Part One

by Ivan Cole

Steelers Nation

In August 2015, I spent a delightful day indulging in a Pittsburgh sports feast with Rebecca. We spent the afternoon attending Steelers training camp in Latrobe, and then the evening taking in a Pittsburgh Pirates game at PNC Park.

One of many things that struck me that day was the difference in mood at the respective venues.

Character (Ac)Counts: CB Artie Burns

via Steelers.com

I’ll admit it. When I began my Momma’s Mock Drafts scouting process, Artie Burns wasn’t even on my radar. But by the time I put together the final seven-round draft, Burns had moved up from being projected to go in the third round or so, due to the obvious rawness of his technique, to being projected to go in the first round. Which, of course, he did.

And I will freely admit he wasn’t my first choice—I picked Mackensie Alexander or William Jackson, whichever one was still on the board, and put Burns as my choice if they were both gone. Jackson was famously picked by the Bengals one pick before the Steelers could choose, and the conspiracy theories ran rampant. Alexander was, despite his assertion he was the best cornerback in the class, taken in the 2nd round by the Vikings.

And although it isn’t the focus of this article, it is interesting to see how everyone has done, so I’ll get that out of the way first. I’ll cover all the guys taken between Jalen Ramsey and Alexander.

On Second Thought: Is There Hope for the 2016 Steelers?

The title of this post may seem odd to those of you who read yesterday’s game commentary, which contained choice items such as:

• I’m afraid I see another of Ben Roethlisberger’s precious remaining years going down the tubes.
• I begin to fear we’ve seen the best of Ben Roethlisberger already.
• It’s been tempting this season to think that unfortunate circumstances have conspired to pull the Steelers down. But they are second in the AFC North, could well be third after tonight’s game, and it’s pretty clear that unless something remarkable happens to the AFC West, in a bad way, there are going to be no wild card spots for an AFC North team. Yes, a lot can happen in seven games, but probably not that much.

So the short answer to the question posed by the title would appear to be “no.” But since this makes for an awfully short article, and since I prefer to contemplate good possibilities than fear bad ones, let’s see what can be dredged up by, well, going deeper.

The Case for The Pittsburgh Steelers in 2016: Part 1

by Ivan Cole

AP photo

In some ways it can be argued that this post is premature. For one thing, as I write this the roster hasn’t been cut to 75 yet, much less the final 53.

However, this year, more than most, the issues which will influence this team’s fate seem pretty straightforward and are unlikely to be significantly affected by personnel decisions involving lower in the depth chart players.

Also, as they say, any battle plan goes out the window once the first shot is fired. Acknowledging such, I am more interested in some level of accuracy as it relates to the broader themes as opposed to the details, and to my thinking, the themes are clear.

Leadership and management