offensive line woes and willie parker

[Suitanim]

Jack Del Rio was outcoached by a mile in this last game...and Cowher was nowhere near at his best.

[tony hipchest]

Originally Posted by Livinginthe past

I didnt call him the worst - I said he was 'one of the worst' in the league - but even this may or may not be an exaggeration.

The thing is due to the fact that they are one of the more talented, well drilled teams in the league - the Steelers are playing alot of 'big games' both in the regular season and in the playoffs - this is when people scruitinise coaches and players with great intensity.

It may be fair to say that the Arizona Cardinals or the 49ers have staff that is worse at thinking on-the-fly - but its just thats its not highlighted as much due to their teams consistent lack of recent success - they dont get involved in many tight games that mean anything.

Cheers

NM

there you go again...splitting hairs for the sake of debate. let me rephrase my statement to patsfanology: calling cowher ONE OF THE WORST AT ANYTHING IS A BIT EXTREME. i never accused you of calling cowher the worst. it may be fair to say that 31 out of 32 coaches are the worst every year for not winning the superbowl but i wont go to that extreme cause i recognize the great jobs many people do all across the nfl. ultimately football is about entertainment and even though barry sanders never won a ring doesnt mean i cant appreciate all the great things he done and call him one of the best. (dont worry .... we all know kevin faulk was/is better)

[Livinginthe past]

Originally Posted by tony hipchest

there you go again...splitting hairs for the sake of debate. let me rephrase my statement to patsfanology: calling cowher ONE OF THE WORST AT ANYTHING IS A BIT EXTREME. i never accused you of calling cowher the worst. it may be fair to say that 31 out of 32 coaches are the worst every year for not winning the superbowl but i wont go to that extreme cause i recognize the great jobs many people do all across the nfl. ultimately football is about entertainment and even though barry sanders never won a ring doesnt mean i cant appreciate all the great things he done and call him one of the best. (dont worry .... we all know kevin faulk was/is better)

Ok - dont want to get caught up in semantics on this one.

We can all go back and read the posts made in this thread.

My stance is that considering the talent at his disposal - and yes he has a big part in getting that talent in the first place - he lets his team down in the clutch moments of big games with his over reliance on dominating run.

We all know what he is going to do before he does it - its great fun to run all over average competition during the regular season - but come the playoffs you need to have a plan B because teams WILL take away your plan A.

Luckily if Cowher opens his eyes he will notice he has a player very capable of Quarterbacking his team to success by regularly passing on first and second down, to make teams second guess before stacking up against the run every 1st down.

Cheers

NM

[BlitzburghRockCity]

Fortunately we have good RB's and a good OL to carry out our running game philosphy...

I wouldnt call cowher the worst or one of the worst or whatever at anything..but I do see your point in that there is something to be said for dancing w/ what brought ya here, but u also have to be flexible and game plan alittle more on offense.

Dick lebeau game plans like crazy on defense.. and we dominate more often than not.. perhaps seeing the offense game plan more would be something to look forward too.

[Rotorhead]

I seem to recall the year we let the Off Coord change the regular gameplan to open up the offense. We went 6-10 that year. Cowher has built a team (O-line, runners, receivers) based on running, and it would take a complete rebuild to change the dynamics of how the offense is run. The steelers (like the broncos) are built to be a running team first. Whether we run to open up opportunities in passing with the run, or pass a little to open up the running game a little more (which I think is what we need to do to utilize Willie) we still are going to run more often than not. Maddox can be a good QB in a different system, one that emphasizes a passing attack more. I think Ben and Parker will be a good combination in the future because with Ben, teams can not stack the line like in years past. We needed punishing runners to move the ball against the "8 in the box" mentality. With Heath, Ward, Wilson, ARE out there, teams will get burned trying that. That plays very well into Willie's style of play as our O-line will be able to open up holes for Willie to get big yardage through. Willie still has to get some comfort level with how the line works and vice-versa. It was good that Cowher stuck with Willie in the running game, he needs the repititions. I think we will see this really pay off later in the year when Duce is killing defenses with fresh legs and when teams try to counter that Ben will be killing them through the air. Sorry that turned out to be a little more longwinded that I intended haha