Physical Steelers Offense Dead, Replaced By Ego Ball
Matt Steel - 77 minutes ago 6
Ben Roethlisberger sacked by Dante Fowler. (Photo: Charles LeClaire, USA TODAY Sports)
What is Steelers football to you?
To me, it always started with being physical to the opponent, to break the will of the opponent. Nothing exemplified that style of play more than the old I-formation. Send a stout back with a full head of steam to beat on you over and over again. And from that one play, create confusion or hesitancy with play-action, play-action rollouts, counters, traps, jet sweeps, reverses, etc. Design plays off of plays so that the defense has to be honor multiple possibilities.
In other words, I’m going to make you hesitate while I punch you in the mouth. I’m going to confuse you and at the same time try to break your will. It was so successful for so many seasons for the Steelers. We of course haven’t seen it since Ken Whisenhunt was basically forced out by Ben Roethlisberger.
I still believe Mike Tomlin was and is the right man for the job. I didn’t think of Whisenhunt as a leader of men in quite the same way as Tomlin, and I don’t think the franchise quarterback would have approved of the hire of Whisenhunt. Roethlisberger's been trying to dismantle that offense ever since Bruce Arians took over as the offensive coordinator once Tomlin was hired. First went the fullback, then the delayed screens to running backs, and over the last couple years the play-action pass. I wondered on Sunday how many plays remained from the old Whisenhunt offense. You know, the one that allowed Ben to start off his career with a 26-4 record and a Super Bowl championship in his first two seasons in the league.
Ben hated that offense because he wanted more control. He associated that offense and the plays in it with the label of being a game manager. He wanted to be in the shotgun like high school and college and sling the ball around. He always wanted the control of Tom Brady and Peyton Manning. Except he never came to grips with the fact that the pro game is so much more different than college and high school. And he could never admit to himself that he couldn’t play the same type of game as Brady and Manning. Maybe two Super Bowls were good enough for Ben and from there he just wanted to do things his way. Why else would he talk about retirement after a young team ripped off a nine game winning streak prior to the AFC championship game? It was longer than any Roethlisberger has been on since his rookie season.
So when many in the media were predicting the Steelers to cruise to an easy victory against the Jacksonville Jaguars, my gut was telling me (just like it was prior to the Chicago game) that this is a game they’ll lose. The numbers were so lopsided in the favor of a great pass defense combined with a poor run defense for the Jags, I was therefore sure that the Steelers would go pass heavy. I’ve seen this road too many times in recent years. Todd Haley and Roethlisberger just can’t help themselves.
The Steelers' offensive identity now is one where they believe they can exploit one-on-one mismatches. In other words, they’re going to outsmart you. And being the pocket passer that Roethlisberger thinks he is, he’s going to out-execute you down the field. Except that has NEVER been his game. Taking so many sacks, underachieving in point production, and getting so many injuries are the primary reasons the Steelers dumped Arians for Haley.
Haley designed an offense to get the ball out of Roethlisberger’s hands to save himself from himself. The compromise was that Ben could throw more and play a game similar to Brady's. After all, they had to find a way to keep the franchise happy after they got rid of the coordinator who allowed the quarterback to dictate most of what was run in that offense.
And so the the arbitrary goal of 30 points per game has been passed around the last several seasons, with the Steelers never really coming close. It honestly blows my mind that an offensive coordinator and quarterback on the NFL level somehow think they can average 30 points per game with no play-action passing game. I used to love the games when Roethlisberger would average over 10 yards per pass attempt. He could do so much damage off a play-action pass because his size, mobility and throwing touch allowed for huge plays to open up when the initial play was covered. Last Sunday against the Ravens, Le'Veon Bell carried the ball 35 times for 146 yards, yet all Roethlisberger could manage was 216 yards on 30 attempts, nowhere near the ten yards per pass he used to so frequently achieve.
By my count, the Steelers ran one play-action pass from under center against the Ravens. I chalk it up to a couple reasons. First and foremost, Roethlisberger’s mobility is horrible. He doesn’t drop back well enough anymore to make the play successful. Second, Bell’s style of running doesn’t lend itself to the play-action game. By being overly patient, linebackers don’t have to attack the line of scrimmage because most of the time Bell isn’t going to.
A couple of weeks ago, I mentioned the Atlanta Falcons' offensive philosophy as being one that would be ideal for the Steelers' offensive talent. I have to backtrack on that. Devonta Freeman and Tevin Coleman are so fast, when they are running a stretch play, if you don’t honor the run, you could be in serious trouble. That opens up the middle of the field for digs, posts, and deep crosses. That’s where that offense does most of it’s damage. Their high octane play-action passing is the primary reason they score so many points. However, Matt Ryan can get out there and run a play fake off a stretch play, while Roethlisberger appears to no longer have the ability to do so. And if that’s the case, he should have retired last year.
That leads me to the biggest problem I have with Roethlisberger, which is his level of physical preparation. Players like Aaron Rodgers and Alex Smith, who are close to the same age as Roethlisberger, have not lost a step in terms of speed and mobility. Smith looks faster and stronger than ever for the Kansas City Chiefs. It shows up in the success of his offense. Several times this year, in just the couple games I’ve sporadically watched, I’ve seen Smith escape pressure to either run for a first down or make a completion on the run to pick up a first down.
In today’s day in age of pilates, yoga, myofascial therapy, acupuncture, nutrition, and biomechanically appropriate strength and condition, short of arthritic knees, there is no excuse for Roethlisberger to be that immobile at age 35. When he finally scrambled to pick up a first down on third-and-5 against the Bears, my thought process at that time was that he looked closer to 45 years of age than 35. Regardless of the fact that he’s getting paid about $20 million a year to be the best professional athlete he can be, he still doesn’t do everything in his power during the offseason to be at his best in every facet of the game at his position. That should be a clear sign that the importance of winning for him only goes so far.
Regardless of whether he’s not doing it because he doesn’t think it’s that important or because he’s physically incapable, he should have retired after last season either way. Roethlisberger in my opinion seems content with trying to win without a play-action game while being primarily stationary from the pocket. He’s always wanted to win playing that game anyway. Yet when he bought time in Super Bowl XL on third-and-29 to connect with Hines Ward at the 1-yard line, a similar looking opportunity in Chicago to escape to his left ended in him holding the ball to the point that it resulted in a sack-fumble-turnover.
Mobility is such an important part of the position. Growing up watching pocket-passing champions from Joe Montana to Troy Aikman to John Elway, all of them had enough mobility to pick up a first down with their legs if necessary. Mobility just creates that much more hesitation in a defender due to possibility of other options being possibilities off the offensive look. No doubt the threat of Deshaun Watson’s mobility has gone a long way toward that team scoring 90 points over the last two weeks.
The Steelers don’t have an offense that sets up plays off of other plays anymore. That’s why you can see the Steelers in a power look for several plays and rather than running a play-action or misdirection, they’ll randomly back out into the shotgun and start running plays from unrelated formations.
The Steelers appeared to open the second half letting Roethlisberger call plays out of the no-huddle. When the drive stalled at the 2-yard line, it allowed Rothlisberger to stick with it on the second possession of the third quarter, which was a ticking time bomb against that pass defense.
For Roethliberger to think he could be successful against that defense relying heavily on the pass just shows the ego that he possesses. And that’s what the Steelers offense is to me at this point: ego ball.
Haley would like to try and outsmart everyone with an offense that will look to expose one-on-one weaknesses, while Roethlisberger would like to throw the ball 40-50 times from the shotgun. But arrogance most time breads ignorance, and so we’ve seen these similar-looking losses over the last several years. If I had to sum up the ignorance in one play, it would be the fact that Ben thought it was good idea to call an out and up from the 2-yard line.
Gone are the days where I feel highly confident that the Steelers will convert third-and-long. I remember Verron Haynes taking delayed screens on third-and-10 or longer and converting third downs. I remember Roethlisberger running for first downs on third-and-13 in both opening posessions that led to touchdowns against the undefeated Philadelphia Eagles in 2004. I remember Willie Parker taking a delayed screen and racing for 50-plus against Tennessee, and an easy score against the Bengals to close a 10-0 deficit in the 2005 AFC wildcard round, or Ward and Antwaan Randle El running their pick-your-single-coverage-poison on third-down touchdown passes out of the shotgun in the 2005 wild-card round and divisional round. I don’t see any of those plays anymore. And I have little faith in the third-down offense anymore.
The Jaguars and Bears beat the Steelers with Steelers football. They did so with putrid quarterbacks who couldn’t even throw for 100 yards. There’s a good chance the talented defense would have more success stopping those teams' rushing attacks had they been preparing against that style of football during training camp. The Jaguars' running backs weren’t even averaging 3.0 yards per carry when they took a 7-3 lead on Sunday. Yet, unlike the Steelers, who are all too quick to abandon the run when they start with a similar average, the Jaguars stuck with it and slowly wore down what had to be a demoralized Steelers defense that had watched their impatient offense go from having a 9-7 lead to a 20-9 deficit without even stepping on the field. Similar impatience that old Steelers teams used to capitalize on.
And so it's another season of handing victories to teams that shouldn’t beat them due to their persistence on playing impatient, I’m-smarter-than-you-and-I’m-going-to-prove-it football. Long gone is physical Steelers offensive football, long ago replaced by ego ball.
It’s high time to get back to Steelers football, which means they’re overdue to move on from Haley and Roethlisberger.
https://scout.com/nfl/steelers/Article/Physical-Steelers-Offense-Dead-Replaced-By-Ego-Ball-108727051
Matt Steel - 77 minutes ago 6
Ben Roethlisberger sacked by Dante Fowler. (Photo: Charles LeClaire, USA TODAY Sports)
What is Steelers football to you?
To me, it always started with being physical to the opponent, to break the will of the opponent. Nothing exemplified that style of play more than the old I-formation. Send a stout back with a full head of steam to beat on you over and over again. And from that one play, create confusion or hesitancy with play-action, play-action rollouts, counters, traps, jet sweeps, reverses, etc. Design plays off of plays so that the defense has to be honor multiple possibilities.
In other words, I’m going to make you hesitate while I punch you in the mouth. I’m going to confuse you and at the same time try to break your will. It was so successful for so many seasons for the Steelers. We of course haven’t seen it since Ken Whisenhunt was basically forced out by Ben Roethlisberger.
I still believe Mike Tomlin was and is the right man for the job. I didn’t think of Whisenhunt as a leader of men in quite the same way as Tomlin, and I don’t think the franchise quarterback would have approved of the hire of Whisenhunt. Roethlisberger's been trying to dismantle that offense ever since Bruce Arians took over as the offensive coordinator once Tomlin was hired. First went the fullback, then the delayed screens to running backs, and over the last couple years the play-action pass. I wondered on Sunday how many plays remained from the old Whisenhunt offense. You know, the one that allowed Ben to start off his career with a 26-4 record and a Super Bowl championship in his first two seasons in the league.
Ben hated that offense because he wanted more control. He associated that offense and the plays in it with the label of being a game manager. He wanted to be in the shotgun like high school and college and sling the ball around. He always wanted the control of Tom Brady and Peyton Manning. Except he never came to grips with the fact that the pro game is so much more different than college and high school. And he could never admit to himself that he couldn’t play the same type of game as Brady and Manning. Maybe two Super Bowls were good enough for Ben and from there he just wanted to do things his way. Why else would he talk about retirement after a young team ripped off a nine game winning streak prior to the AFC championship game? It was longer than any Roethlisberger has been on since his rookie season.
So when many in the media were predicting the Steelers to cruise to an easy victory against the Jacksonville Jaguars, my gut was telling me (just like it was prior to the Chicago game) that this is a game they’ll lose. The numbers were so lopsided in the favor of a great pass defense combined with a poor run defense for the Jags, I was therefore sure that the Steelers would go pass heavy. I’ve seen this road too many times in recent years. Todd Haley and Roethlisberger just can’t help themselves.
The Steelers' offensive identity now is one where they believe they can exploit one-on-one mismatches. In other words, they’re going to outsmart you. And being the pocket passer that Roethlisberger thinks he is, he’s going to out-execute you down the field. Except that has NEVER been his game. Taking so many sacks, underachieving in point production, and getting so many injuries are the primary reasons the Steelers dumped Arians for Haley.
Haley designed an offense to get the ball out of Roethlisberger’s hands to save himself from himself. The compromise was that Ben could throw more and play a game similar to Brady's. After all, they had to find a way to keep the franchise happy after they got rid of the coordinator who allowed the quarterback to dictate most of what was run in that offense.
And so the the arbitrary goal of 30 points per game has been passed around the last several seasons, with the Steelers never really coming close. It honestly blows my mind that an offensive coordinator and quarterback on the NFL level somehow think they can average 30 points per game with no play-action passing game. I used to love the games when Roethlisberger would average over 10 yards per pass attempt. He could do so much damage off a play-action pass because his size, mobility and throwing touch allowed for huge plays to open up when the initial play was covered. Last Sunday against the Ravens, Le'Veon Bell carried the ball 35 times for 146 yards, yet all Roethlisberger could manage was 216 yards on 30 attempts, nowhere near the ten yards per pass he used to so frequently achieve.
By my count, the Steelers ran one play-action pass from under center against the Ravens. I chalk it up to a couple reasons. First and foremost, Roethlisberger’s mobility is horrible. He doesn’t drop back well enough anymore to make the play successful. Second, Bell’s style of running doesn’t lend itself to the play-action game. By being overly patient, linebackers don’t have to attack the line of scrimmage because most of the time Bell isn’t going to.
A couple of weeks ago, I mentioned the Atlanta Falcons' offensive philosophy as being one that would be ideal for the Steelers' offensive talent. I have to backtrack on that. Devonta Freeman and Tevin Coleman are so fast, when they are running a stretch play, if you don’t honor the run, you could be in serious trouble. That opens up the middle of the field for digs, posts, and deep crosses. That’s where that offense does most of it’s damage. Their high octane play-action passing is the primary reason they score so many points. However, Matt Ryan can get out there and run a play fake off a stretch play, while Roethlisberger appears to no longer have the ability to do so. And if that’s the case, he should have retired last year.
That leads me to the biggest problem I have with Roethlisberger, which is his level of physical preparation. Players like Aaron Rodgers and Alex Smith, who are close to the same age as Roethlisberger, have not lost a step in terms of speed and mobility. Smith looks faster and stronger than ever for the Kansas City Chiefs. It shows up in the success of his offense. Several times this year, in just the couple games I’ve sporadically watched, I’ve seen Smith escape pressure to either run for a first down or make a completion on the run to pick up a first down.
In today’s day in age of pilates, yoga, myofascial therapy, acupuncture, nutrition, and biomechanically appropriate strength and condition, short of arthritic knees, there is no excuse for Roethlisberger to be that immobile at age 35. When he finally scrambled to pick up a first down on third-and-5 against the Bears, my thought process at that time was that he looked closer to 45 years of age than 35. Regardless of the fact that he’s getting paid about $20 million a year to be the best professional athlete he can be, he still doesn’t do everything in his power during the offseason to be at his best in every facet of the game at his position. That should be a clear sign that the importance of winning for him only goes so far.
Regardless of whether he’s not doing it because he doesn’t think it’s that important or because he’s physically incapable, he should have retired after last season either way. Roethlisberger in my opinion seems content with trying to win without a play-action game while being primarily stationary from the pocket. He’s always wanted to win playing that game anyway. Yet when he bought time in Super Bowl XL on third-and-29 to connect with Hines Ward at the 1-yard line, a similar looking opportunity in Chicago to escape to his left ended in him holding the ball to the point that it resulted in a sack-fumble-turnover.
Mobility is such an important part of the position. Growing up watching pocket-passing champions from Joe Montana to Troy Aikman to John Elway, all of them had enough mobility to pick up a first down with their legs if necessary. Mobility just creates that much more hesitation in a defender due to possibility of other options being possibilities off the offensive look. No doubt the threat of Deshaun Watson’s mobility has gone a long way toward that team scoring 90 points over the last two weeks.
The Steelers don’t have an offense that sets up plays off of other plays anymore. That’s why you can see the Steelers in a power look for several plays and rather than running a play-action or misdirection, they’ll randomly back out into the shotgun and start running plays from unrelated formations.
The Steelers appeared to open the second half letting Roethlisberger call plays out of the no-huddle. When the drive stalled at the 2-yard line, it allowed Rothlisberger to stick with it on the second possession of the third quarter, which was a ticking time bomb against that pass defense.
For Roethliberger to think he could be successful against that defense relying heavily on the pass just shows the ego that he possesses. And that’s what the Steelers offense is to me at this point: ego ball.
Haley would like to try and outsmart everyone with an offense that will look to expose one-on-one weaknesses, while Roethlisberger would like to throw the ball 40-50 times from the shotgun. But arrogance most time breads ignorance, and so we’ve seen these similar-looking losses over the last several years. If I had to sum up the ignorance in one play, it would be the fact that Ben thought it was good idea to call an out and up from the 2-yard line.
Gone are the days where I feel highly confident that the Steelers will convert third-and-long. I remember Verron Haynes taking delayed screens on third-and-10 or longer and converting third downs. I remember Roethlisberger running for first downs on third-and-13 in both opening posessions that led to touchdowns against the undefeated Philadelphia Eagles in 2004. I remember Willie Parker taking a delayed screen and racing for 50-plus against Tennessee, and an easy score against the Bengals to close a 10-0 deficit in the 2005 AFC wildcard round, or Ward and Antwaan Randle El running their pick-your-single-coverage-poison on third-down touchdown passes out of the shotgun in the 2005 wild-card round and divisional round. I don’t see any of those plays anymore. And I have little faith in the third-down offense anymore.
The Jaguars and Bears beat the Steelers with Steelers football. They did so with putrid quarterbacks who couldn’t even throw for 100 yards. There’s a good chance the talented defense would have more success stopping those teams' rushing attacks had they been preparing against that style of football during training camp. The Jaguars' running backs weren’t even averaging 3.0 yards per carry when they took a 7-3 lead on Sunday. Yet, unlike the Steelers, who are all too quick to abandon the run when they start with a similar average, the Jaguars stuck with it and slowly wore down what had to be a demoralized Steelers defense that had watched their impatient offense go from having a 9-7 lead to a 20-9 deficit without even stepping on the field. Similar impatience that old Steelers teams used to capitalize on.
And so it's another season of handing victories to teams that shouldn’t beat them due to their persistence on playing impatient, I’m-smarter-than-you-and-I’m-going-to-prove-it football. Long gone is physical Steelers offensive football, long ago replaced by ego ball.
It’s high time to get back to Steelers football, which means they’re overdue to move on from Haley and Roethlisberger.
https://scout.com/nfl/steelers/Article/Physical-Steelers-Offense-Dead-Replaced-By-Ego-Ball-108727051
