Steel Town can lay claim to one thing that no other team in the National Football League can—they have won six Super Bowl titles. For the most part, the team can say they have done so with pride and character; with players they can be proud to call Steelers.
Only two years removed from Super Bowl win number six, even the most faithful of Steeler fans would have a hard time saying that they are proud of the players on the team. Ben Roethlisberger has been all over the news for his fateful night in a Georgia college town and the resulting fallout. Santonio Holmes had one legal issue too many for the Steelers and decided to deal the former Super Bowl MVP to the New York Jets. Kicker Jeff Reed almost seemed to be upset that his psychological evaluation did not get as much press as Ben Roethlisberger’s evaluation did.
One thing that can be for certain, troubled, bruised egos or not, the Steelers will look to make a comeback after a woeful showing as defending champions last season. Like every other team, their journey starts in training and mini-camp.
Quarterback challenge
One of the many controversies that afflicted the Steelers during the off-season had a major effect on training and mini-camp and will continue to do so for at least the first four games of the regular season if not the first six.
Thanks the behavior of Ben Roethlisberger earlier this off-season (paired with an existing civil suit stemming from similar accusations out of Nevada) the Steelers will have to do without the leader of their offense for a significant portion of the season.
The Steelers handled the off-season in a rather interesting fashion considering that Roethlisberger will be on the sideline for the beginning of the season. While he was getting evaluated by psychologists he was told to stay away from the team and team-related activities. In that time, his potential replacements, Byron Leftwich, Dennis Dixon, and Charlie batch, shared the snaps during team workouts. However, once Roethlisberger was cleared to rejoin the team he took the majority of snaps.
As the consensus starter for the team that makes sense. As the guy that will also likely be on the bench for the first six games it does not. The Titans showed last year how hard it is to resurrect a playoff chase when you lose the first six games. With the familiarity of each of Roethlisberger’s potential replacements with the offense in question, it might have made sense for head coach Mike Tomlin to better prepare the man that is going to start the season so that there will still be one left for Roethlisberger to win once he does play.
Tomlin confident after off-season practices
The Steelers were one of the first teams to completely wrap up their off-season workout with the final practice taking place on June 10th, a workout at the place they call home, Heinz Field.
For the Steelers, a lot of the work revolved around the young guys and rookies. With them having little to no familiarity with the NFL game and the way the Pittsburgh Steelers play it, it takes time to get them up to speed and where the Steelers want them.
With training and mini-camp now over and done with, head coach Mike Tomlin can look back on them and feel good about the work that was done. Tomlin has seen enough during his time in the NFL not to take too much from training and mini-camp though. Players are not really challenged too much when there is no imminent threat of a violent collision.
Tomlin’s approach is a little different than some coaches. Many would love to take the chance to pump up the confidence of the team by showering them with praise—when the workouts were the easiest. He also knows that the true measure of success will come when the team steps on the field come fall.
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