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Troy Polamalu

Steelers Defense Not Immune To Youth Movement

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I’ve written a lot this season about the decline of Pittsburgh Steelers all-time great Hines Ward. It was never my intent to turn this into a Hines Hater blog but the combination of his being one of the faces of the current era of Black and Gold greatness and the fact the national media was totally out of the loop in regards to his rapidly diminishing importance, I felt like I had to keep harping on it. Also, despite Hines’ insistence that the feels he’s “owed nothing” by the team, I have a feeling the eventual break-up is going to be a painful one. And Steeler Nation should be prepared for an ugly fall-out.

While I’ve been focusing on Hines, however, I’ve neglected the other side of the ball.

A couple things happened during Sunday’s game against the Kansas City Chiefs which really hit home to me that Hines may not be the only Steeler mainstay facing his last stand. First, the Chiefs offense had a fleeting moment of competence in the second quarter when Tyler Palko stared down a blitzing linebacker and converted a big third down. “Stared down” is a bit of an overstatement as James Farrior was sent up the middle on a fire blitz and while nothing but the faint scent of failure stood between him and Palko, the ball was delivered before James had crossed the line of scrimmage. Then, late in the game, with the Chiefs moving the ball on an exhausted Steeler defense, the cameras repeatedly cut to a shot of Casey Hampton sucking wind on the sideline.
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Steelers Don’t Want To Save Troy Polamalu’s Brain

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And people call it Pittsburgh Paranoia…

I usually turn off whatever horrible commentary team the networks have saddled us with and watch the game alongside the Pittsburgh Steelers radio crew of Bill Hillgrove, Tunch Ilkin and Craig Wolfley. Unfortunately, my flight was delayed getting back to the ‘Burgh so I was forced to listen to well-known Steeler-haters Cris Collinsworth and Al Michaels on Sunday. After the NFL’s answer to JLO, Michele Tafoya, gave an update on the condition of Troy Polamalu, Michaels threw a shot at the Steelers by sarcastically comparing their disclosure of information relating to injuries to the approach taken by the commies in “old East Germany.”

Now another noted Steeler-hater, Mike Florio at Profootballtalk, is jumping on the pile. Yesterday, he wrote a scathing piece in which he all but accused the Steelers of going all SuckerPunch on Troy and turning a blind eye as he becomes a vegetable. As usual with Florio, he doesn’t let little things like facts or common sense stand in the way of his Pittsburgh-bashing. In the very same article, he praises the Jets for their handling of Dustin Keller’s recent concussion.
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Week 12 Recap: Thanksgiving Hangover

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Ummmm… Did somebody forget to tell the Black and Gold their bye week ended on Sunday?

The Pittsburgh Steelers put on a dull, sloppy, uninspired performance last night in defeating the Kansas City Chiefs 13-9. The teams got into a mini-Battle Royal during pre-game warm-ups and the Chiefs defense brought that fired up attitude into the game. If you’re a fan of offensive football, this was not a game for you as the bumbling Steeler offense couldn’t get on track despite the inept KC offense trying over and over to give them the game. Much like the Colts game earlier this season, the Steelers played down to the level of their opponent long enough that a team they should have blown-out like a birthday candle was in position to drive for the winning score in the final minutes.

The Steelers defense did all they could despite getting hit hard by injuries. LaMarr Woodley missed his third straight game while Troy Polamalu was lost on the first series. Once again, the reason for his absence is being listed as “concussion-like symptoms” which is Steeler-speak for “He probably has a concussion but we don’t want to make him go through all those baseline tests to get him back on the field.” Even without two of their top defensive players, the defense put on one of their better efforts of the year, holding the Chiefs to 250 yards of total offense and forcing four turnovers. Three of those came on interceptions, including one by noted stonehands Ike Taylor.

Considering the “pass” he intercepted more closely resembled a punt, I would expect Face Me Ike’s next one to occur sometime around 2013.
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Troy Polamalu Tells Wife: “No Twitter For You!”

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Free Theodora!

Total Steelers is on Twitter (and if you’re not following me you’re hurting my feelings). I don’t spend all day on it but I do occasionally drop in to make fun of things like the Baltimore Ravens epic fail in Jacksonville. Mostly, I use it to check up on the handful of Pittsburgh Steelers who tweet. Yes, even that annoying blowhard Ryan Clark.

I’ve found most twitter feeds to be spectacularly boring. Many are clearly run by PR people who are using them to promote whatever perfume or charitable cause the celebrity is involved with that week. Those that are run by the actual person tend to be filled with mindless chitchat and re-tweets from starstruck fans. Very few athletes put Twitter to good use, such as using it to hook up with a smokin’ hot (and extremely flexible) porn star.

As I was mocking the Ratbirds in 140 characters or less, I noticed an interesting name in my “Who To Follow” box. Theodora V. Polamalu. Theodora, you may deduce from the last name, is the wife of All-Pro safety Troy Polamalu. I quickly went over to check her feed.

Other than the first tweet being of the PR variety, the rest of her posts were clearly coming directly from her. And what tweets they were. It wasn’t the usual soundbites and politely phrased BS we’ve come to expect. These were opinionated and insightful messages. And many of them were about the Steelers!
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Roger Goodell Doesn’t Care About Family

Congratulations go out to Commissioner Roger Goodell. His goal has finally been achieved. He has successfully pussified the National Football League.

I tuned in to the Four Letter hoping to hear Trent Dilfer announce he was coming out of retirement to play for the Baltimore Ravens. He certainly couldn’t do any worse than last night’s performance by Joe Flacco. But rather than glorious analysis highlighting every one of the Ratbirds many flaws, I instead had to listen to the talking heads go on and on about the catfight between the Detroit Lions’ Ndamukong Suh and several members of the Atlanta Falcons. For those lucky smart enough to avoid the mind-numbing prattle, the story goes after quarterback Matt Ryan was hurt on a play late in Sunday’s game, Suh and teammate Cliff Avril stood there taunting him about the injury.

OH NOES! THE HORROR!
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Know Thy Enemy: Arizona Cardinals

This Sunday it will be deja vu all over again when the [intlink id=”20″ type=”category”]Pittsburgh Steelers[/intlink] face off against the Arizona Cardinals. The Cards are still led by our ex-offensive coordinator, Ken Whisenhunt, and boast a roster filled with refugees from the Black and Gold. Whiz must really admire his old franchise (and why shouldn’t he?) what with his almost comical fetish for adding ex-Steelers to his team. When the Steelers step inside the Big Toaster on Sunday, they’ll see no fewer than four ex-teammates across the sidelines with two more members of the roster having played their college ball at Pitt.

Pittsburgh and their slacker younger brother have faced each other twice since that fateful off-season of 2007 when [intlink id=”49″ type=”category”]Bill Cowher[/intlink] left to exchange phony laughs with James Brown and pretend to understand the words coming out of Shannon Sharpe’s mush-mouth. Whiz, the obvious heir apparent (he even has his own mini-Chin!), was surprisingly eliminated early in the process, leading him to bolt for the head job in Arizona. After the media erroneously reported longtime offensive line coach Russ Grimm had won the job, the Steelers announced they were going with a relatively unknown defensive coordinator from Minnesota named [intlink id=”45″ type=”category”]Mike Tomlin[/intlink]. That year, the two teams met during the regular season with the Cardinals scoring an emotional victory in a game their spurned head coach badly wanted to win.

Of course, the next time the two teams met, the Steelers would walk away with a victory in Super Bowl XLIII. He who laughs last, laughs best and all that.
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Week 6 Recap: Yo Gobble Gabbert

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Sometimes you drink the wine and sometimes you stomp the grapes. This week, the [intlink id=”21″ type=”category”]Pittsburgh Steelers[/intlink] put on a performance more reminiscent of prune juice. It started off nice and smooth but about an hour and a half later you were left with a queasy feeling that had you praying to the porcelain god that the whole ordeal would soon be over.

The scoreboard says the Black and Gold defeated the Jacksonville Jaguars 17-13. The Pessimistic Inner Yinzer says, “Hey yous guys, we was lucky to walk away with a W. Against a halfway decent team, we wouldn’t be so lucky n’at.” Bill Cowher was fond of saying you are what your record says you are while [intlink id=”86″ type=”category”]Mike Tomlin [/intlink]likes to say there are no awards for style points. Well, the win-loss column may say the Steelers are 4-2 but the style of play tells me this is not a 4-2 caliber team.

Picking up from last week’s thumping of the Tennessee Titans, the Steelers dominated on both sides of the ball for the first thirty minutes. The offense racked up 315 yards of total offense while the defense held Jacksonville under 90. [intlink id=”88″ type=”category”]Rashard Mendenhall[/intlink] ran like a spy drone was hot on his tail, ripping off a 68 yarder in route to a 113 yard first half performance. [intlink id=”14″ type=”category”]Ben Roethlisberger[/intlink] completed 11 passes for 181 yards, highlighted by a 28 yard touchdown to [intlink id=”82″ type=”category”]Mike Wallace[/intlink]. His opposite number, Jacksonville rookie quarterback Blaine Gabbert, couldn’t get anything going. He was under constant siege from a ferocious Blitzburgh defense, particularly [intlink id=”70″ type=”category”]LaMarr Woodley[/intlink] and  Brett Keisel, who would finish with two sacks apiece.
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Week 3 Recap: Flirting With Disaster

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Remember last week when I wrote about uninspiring victories…

For those readers too old to stay up late or those who simply could not stomach the carnage, your [intlink id=”21″ type=”category”]Pittsburgh Steelers[/intlink] managed to squeak by the Indianapolis Colts 23-20 on a last second Shaun Suisham field goal last night on NBC Sunday Night Football. I don’t know what’s more impressive, that Suisham made a clutch kick or that the Steelers were able to find eleven guys to put on the field for the attempt. I don’t know how many ice baths they have in Lucas Oil Stadium but I guarantee there won’t be enough. Perhaps everyone will just have to share.

Pity the poor fool who ends up with Chris Kemoeatu.

The Steelers, ten point favorites according to the leg-breakers out in Vegas, should have lost. If not for absolutely inept quarterbacking by the fearsome duo of Kerry Collins and Curtis Painter, they probably would have. This game basically came down to two plays which determined the final outcome. First was Painter’s overthrow of a wide open Pierre Garcon, who ran a simple slant-and-go route which [intlink id=”101″ type=”category”]Ike Taylor[/intlink] inexplicably bailed on after the slant part. Had Painter completed the pass, there was nothing but 75 yards of green grass and high tides forever.
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Sifting Through The Wreckage Of Steeler Victory

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A couple weeks ago, I attended the Pitt Panthers’ “victory” over the vaunted Black Bears of Maine. Oh, I’m not an alumni but when you’ve spent your collegiate years getting hyped for the annual Nerd Bowl between my beloved alma mater, Carnegie Mellon, and their hated rivals from Case Western, you learn to take what you can get. Besides, I like to visit Heinz Field at least once a year and since Steelers tickets are impossible to get, Pitt games are a reasonable alternative. Hearing the fans in attendance shout “High Octane!” as Pitt and their brand new redneck carpetbagger head coach did everything in their power to lose to a Division I-AA school gave new meaning to “losing by winning.”

That is until Sunday.

Truth be told, I struggled writing my recap of the [intlink id=”21″ type=”category”]Pittsburgh Steelers[/intlink] decimation of the Seattle Seahawks this past weekend. Which is odd not only because it was a rousing victory, but, as my friends and family will tell gladly tell you with with eyes rolling, I’m never at a loss for words when it comes to talking Stillers. But listening to talk radio today where the topic du jour seemed to be Pitt’s impending defection to the ACC (Pittsburgh moved to the Atlantic coast? Clearly the conference commissioners did not attend CMU) rather than the Steelers game, I realized I was not alone. It’s almost as if Sunday’s game was being treated like a meaningless preseason exhibition rather than a legitimate NFL game.
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