Wednesday, November 14, 2007

Only Lee Mays Can Save Us Now

Everybody take a deep breath. Mike Tomlin says there won't be any knee-jerk reactions to what happened with the truly special teams Sunday (here's the transcript). Which means nobody's getting cut, although there could be some starters showing up on the coverage teams. As far as I'm concerned, that's good enough.

Of course, if the Steelers had ONE guy who could tackle this wouldn't even be an issue. I'm exaggerating, but not by much. I know some of you have had your fill of Allan Rossum, but put me in the camp that thinks he's doing a fine job. He can catch, and he knows the rules. That makes him twice as dangerous as anybody the Steelers put back there last season. And I'm a big Willie Reid fan.

By the way, Reid could get the call-up against the Jets -- Andre Frazier and LaMarr Woodley are listed as questionable this week. I know Reid doesn't play linebacker or on the coverage teams, but who is Pittsburgh going to activate, Trai Essex? One more thing: you know how bad the coverage teams are? According to Football Outsiders, Skippy Reed is the best field-goal kicker in the league ... and the unit still ranks 25th. Thank God for the Colts, I guess.

Then there's this, which I mentioned in the comments yesterday: ESPN News reported on Tuesday night that Ryan Clark is out for the year. First I'm hearing of it, but if it's true, that's a big loss. I love Anthony Smith, but the guy makes enough dumb decisions to make me think he shouldn't be starting. You just can't trust him. Yeah, he's crazy and he'll hit anything, but so does Troy Polamalu. It's worth pointing out that Tomlin didn't mention this at the press conference, but if Clark lands on the IR, I wonder who the team will sign. My vote: Lee Mays.

Finally, there was some discussion in the comments about Bill Cowher being overrated. I agree with most of you: no way. I was actually sad to see Cowher resign, and thought he was able to get more out of his players than most other coaches could. I was wrong, of course, because Tomlin also seems to be able to inspire the troops, although in a completely different way.

If you want to see what an overrated coach looks like, here ya go.