Bill Cowher and the Spectacular Steelers.

[The Ancient Enemy]

Bill Coward. I love it. I love plays on names. I invented a few good ones, the ones I can remember right now is Mack Clown and of course WannSPLAT. I saw someone call Marcus Vick "Marcus conVICKt" once on a board and I lost it.

Frosty, you coming back to PA over the holidays or are you staying out in Athens with the Beercats I mean Bobcats? PM me if you're gonna be in the area on Jan 2nd, 3rd, or 4th.

[abpk2903]

We lose 2 games in a row and all the sudden Cowher sucks. He wins the division more than half the time. The if the onsides kick would have worked everyone would be saying that it was a great gutsy call. I probably would not have call the draw play with Ben but he came up a half of yard short and that play would work 50% of the time. Cowher and the coaching staff did a great job confusing Peyton with different Defensive looks late in the 1st half. Thats the most confused Peyton has ever looked. If Pittsburgh can make that field goal it is a entirely different game and we would not be palying from behind the whole time.

[LionPride]

[quote="abpk2903";p="112645"]We lose 2 games in a row and all the sudden Cowher sucks. He wins the division more than half the time. The if the onsides kick would have worked everyone would be saying that it was a great gutsy call. I probably would not have call the draw play with Ben but he came up a half of yard short and that play would work 50% of the time. Cowher and the coaching staff did a great job confusing Peyton with different Defensive looks late in the 1st half. Thats the most confused Peyton has ever looked. If Pittsburgh can make that field goal it is a entirely different game and we would not be palying from behind the whole time.[/quote]

Sorry, I've been saying Cowher sucks for a lot longer than that. Probably about 3 years now.

He does win the division a lot, I'll give you that. But as a Steeler fan, my expectations are higher. He can't win big games, and loses to teams he shouldn't lose to in the playoffs. If your expectations are to win the division every year, Cowher's your guy. But if you expectations are to win a Super Bowl, the Rooney's better find someone else. Unfortunately, the Rooney's expectations are to put rear-ends in seats, and coming close year in and year out will do that.

I credit Lebeau with Manning's confusion. If you remember, when Tiny Tim Lewis was the D-coordinator, they weren't great. If Cowher was the common demoninator for good defensive planning, they would've had great defenses those years too.

[ham55]

The quarterback draw isn't a bad play call. Did we all forget the qb draw vs. San Diego on Monday night early in the season??? That play call, ON THIRD DOWN, gave the Steelers the go ahead touchdown in the 2nd quarter. I realize that it's not as big of a play as it seems, but it did get him into the endzone. BRB will be ok, he had some rust to get off last week vs. one of the best D's in the NFL today. It's a good thing the run happy Steelers face a Bengals rushing D that is, well suspect, to say the very least.

[frostlion]

That was a good call then, but Ben was certainly in finer shape then now. I agree with you he will be ok, just a little rusty..

I seem to recall a few years ago when Fran Gantner was around and JayPA called a QB draw on something like 4th and 9 with Zack Mills at QB. The cameras caught Franny screaming: "Not that God D. play again!!!" Was funny at the time, I think.

[The Ancient Enemy]

Poor Franny. They made that guy a scapegoat and JayPa kept his job. Sigh.

[frostlion]

Agree, most people soon forget that Franny was at the helm for that 94 offense which still is top rated in B10 history. I thought he would have made a fine Head Coach, and if I remember correctly, Michigan State went after him a few years back..

[deliverance]

How can you rip on Cowher? He went 15-1 last year in the regular season with a rookie QB. Yes, I'd want to get rid of him? Good idea. The Steelers are a .500 team without him.

[snake-eyes]

You can spin this game lots of ways, either optomistic or pessimistic. I am going to lean optomistic for the Steelers. Like an earlier post, they only gave up 2 TDs in Indy on an 80 yard bomb and after the onside kick. So defensively they didnt play that bad at all. I mean if you would have said the Steelers gave up 26 points to Indy I would take that.

The problem (as I am sure most of you agree) is the OL. No holes for the running game and no time to pass. Ben is a little rusty and Indy was a tough team to bounce back against after missing 4 games. They need to get that side of the ball corrected.

Lastly, a comment about Cowher and staff. You are always going to have questionable play calls it's just part of the game. I would have liked to have seen them max protect more with 2 wr routes and maybe take some shots deep. They left our tackles on an island with Freeney a lot. No contest.

The good besides the defense is they Cincy and Chicago at home. Both must wins and if they can do that and roll the final 3 weeks this game will be nothing, but an after thought. A great coach once said "Liv t plai anota dai".

[ham55]

Did indy use thier speakers to thier advantage on Monday night???? I've been hearing that rumor tossed around, of course, they're denying it.