Offense & Defense

According to two different stories in today's Pittsburgh papers, new offensive coordinator Ken Whisenhunt is spending a lot of time finding new ways for Hines Ward to beat double coverage and get more man-to-man looks. Unfortunately, Plaxico Burress won't share the same experiences until training camp (although Cowher is ready, willing and able to welcome Burress back to practice). Perhaps most importantly, it looks like Whisenhunt will eschew all the triple-reverse quarterback draws that Mularkey grew so fond of last season, and will instead focus on getting the ball to the guys that can score (namely Ward, Staley and Burress).

Defensively, it looks like new d-coordinator, Dick LeBeau will be implementing a lot more blitzing schemes which is good, but this will leave the cornerbacks in a lot of man-to-man coverage, which is bad -- at least initially. After Chad Scott gets burned for the 7th or 8th TD by week three, we'll see a lot more of Ike Taylor and maybe Ricardo Colclough.