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Took a few days to reflect after the disappointing ending to the season and came to some interesting conclusions. The Steelers are in a very unusual crossroads where it seems like many different avenues are converging that will require many difficult decisions to be made at once. The implications of these decisions could right the ways quickly or set the team back a decade or more.
IMO, the underachieving won't stop until 1. Tomlin is gone and replaced with a more disciplined coach and/or 2. The Steelers start focusing on higher character guys to create a more cohesive locker room...and let me tell you why.
There HAS to be a balance between high level talent and high level team chemistry/leadership. Cowher won a SB because there was a very good balance between both. Once Tomlin took over, the equilibrium began shifting slowly as high level talent was added but at the cost of team chemistry. Martayvus' brief career is a perfect metaphor for the Steeler-way the last 8 years. A guy who had all the talent in the world but could never get out of his own stupid way...sound familiar?
Rarely does the best team on paper win the SB. Look at the SB winning players who left the Steelers and went on to fail on other teams...the list is a long one. The same thing could be said for the Pats who won with inferior but seemingly high character guys (and also had a coach who could manage the "problem" players). But **** the Pats and let's look at the Eagles recent success as a perfect example of this theory. The team won the SB with a backup QB all throughout the playoffs...they were never regarded as the team with the best talent even in their own division. Yet high character/leader type guys like Foles, Wentz (in a coaching role), Chris Long, Ertz, Fletcher Cox, with the help of a good leader in Peterson created the perfect equilibrium of talent and character/leadership to win despite having less overall team talent than probably 10 other teams last year. And those same guys just willed their team to an improbable playoff birth despite having a myriad of injuries and needing to win their last 3 games just to get in.
There are a core group of guys who I would say add to the talent/leadership equilibrium:
On D: Heyward, Tuitt, Hargrave, Watt, Haden, Hilton, Forte (in a backup role), and Edmunds (gets a pass for being a rookie and seems high character)
On O: Ben, Juju, Conner, JaySam, the Oline, Vance, Nix, and Washington (same pass as Edmunds)
The rest of the roster is filled with underachievers on the field who are not good enough or on the other end, too good for their own big heads.
If you're going to bring in guys with questionable character, you need a leader who can manage them. Tomlin is constantly proving he is not that type of coach. Finding a better manager of talent would be a big step in the right direction if they don't want to blow up the current roster. Concurrently, focusing more on bringing in high character/leadership type talent and getting rid of locker room cancers is another big step in the right direction if they want to keep the coaching staff intact. However, the fastest way to get back to the promised land is to do both and blow everything up outside of the players mentioned above (all coaches not named Munchak included).
It's Rooney's chance to turn this team around and he has a lot of difficult decisions to make this offseason. Let's hope he has the balls to make them because this offseason is shaping up to be a major turning point for this franchise.
IMO, the underachieving won't stop until 1. Tomlin is gone and replaced with a more disciplined coach and/or 2. The Steelers start focusing on higher character guys to create a more cohesive locker room...and let me tell you why.
There HAS to be a balance between high level talent and high level team chemistry/leadership. Cowher won a SB because there was a very good balance between both. Once Tomlin took over, the equilibrium began shifting slowly as high level talent was added but at the cost of team chemistry. Martayvus' brief career is a perfect metaphor for the Steeler-way the last 8 years. A guy who had all the talent in the world but could never get out of his own stupid way...sound familiar?
Rarely does the best team on paper win the SB. Look at the SB winning players who left the Steelers and went on to fail on other teams...the list is a long one. The same thing could be said for the Pats who won with inferior but seemingly high character guys (and also had a coach who could manage the "problem" players). But **** the Pats and let's look at the Eagles recent success as a perfect example of this theory. The team won the SB with a backup QB all throughout the playoffs...they were never regarded as the team with the best talent even in their own division. Yet high character/leader type guys like Foles, Wentz (in a coaching role), Chris Long, Ertz, Fletcher Cox, with the help of a good leader in Peterson created the perfect equilibrium of talent and character/leadership to win despite having less overall team talent than probably 10 other teams last year. And those same guys just willed their team to an improbable playoff birth despite having a myriad of injuries and needing to win their last 3 games just to get in.
There are a core group of guys who I would say add to the talent/leadership equilibrium:
On D: Heyward, Tuitt, Hargrave, Watt, Haden, Hilton, Forte (in a backup role), and Edmunds (gets a pass for being a rookie and seems high character)
On O: Ben, Juju, Conner, JaySam, the Oline, Vance, Nix, and Washington (same pass as Edmunds)
The rest of the roster is filled with underachievers on the field who are not good enough or on the other end, too good for their own big heads.
If you're going to bring in guys with questionable character, you need a leader who can manage them. Tomlin is constantly proving he is not that type of coach. Finding a better manager of talent would be a big step in the right direction if they don't want to blow up the current roster. Concurrently, focusing more on bringing in high character/leadership type talent and getting rid of locker room cancers is another big step in the right direction if they want to keep the coaching staff intact. However, the fastest way to get back to the promised land is to do both and blow everything up outside of the players mentioned above (all coaches not named Munchak included).
It's Rooney's chance to turn this team around and he has a lot of difficult decisions to make this offseason. Let's hope he has the balls to make them because this offseason is shaping up to be a major turning point for this franchise.
