Steelers Today – A Pittsburgh Steelers blog

August 8, 2009
By Donald Starver

Okay, let me start off by saying that I got lost last night.  There, I admitted it.

Every year the Steelers hold a night practice at Latrobe Memorial Stadium.  For some reason I, along with about 200 other Steelers fans, thought that Latrobe Memorial Stadium was located at Latrobe High School.  Allow me to be the first to tell those of you who have never been to Steelers training camp that Latrobe Memorial Stadium is NOT located at Latrobe High School.  But at least I had plenty of company at the high school, so I didn’t feel too stupid.

Once I finally made it to the stadium, the Steelers provided an entertaining evening.

The Steelers did their famous backs-on-backers drill for the fans’ entertainment.  This is always a lively drill, and reputations are often made or destroyed during it.

As has been the case for the last 3 years, James Harrison was practically unstoppable during this drill.  The rest of the NFL learned last year what Steelers running backs have known all along; Harrison cannot be blocked.

One player who began creating a reputation for himself last night was Frank “the tank” Summers.  Summers did what most thought was virtually impossible.  He stopped James Harrison’s bull rush.  While that was impressive, Summers’ drill didn’t start off quite so well, as he completely missed a block on Andre Frazier in his first attempt at the drill.  Frazier went around Summers like wind goes around a tree.  But after that, Summers came into his own.  Summers completely neutralized Keyaron Fox’s attempt to beat the rookie.  He also stopped Tom Korte dead in his tracks, and then pushed him back 3 yards with a hard shove at the end for good measures.  As the grand finale to the drill, head coach Mike Tomlin called out Summers and James Harrison to be the final combatants of the drill.  As teammates looked on, James Harrison began his charge towards Summers.  I assumed that Harrison would want to bully Summers to show that Summers’ earlier win against Harrison’s bull rush was a fluke.  But instead, Harrison hit Summers with a last second swim move and blew right past him.  Score one for the veteran.

Summers need not feel bad though.  Nobody else has figured out how to stop Harrison either.

In other match-ups, Bruce Davis bull rushed Willie Parker into the next county.  Donovan Woods went around Rashard Mendenhall as though he weren’t even there.  So did Patrick Bailey.  Mr. Mendenhall definitely needs to work on his blocking technique.  Rookie tight end David Johnson stopped Lawrence Timmons cold.  He did the exact same thing to Andre Frazier and then pushed him backwards 5 yards for good measures.  I have been extremely impressed by Johnson’s blocking.  Rookie running back Isaac Redman held off Andrew Schantz and Keyaron Fox.  He also drove Bruce Davis into the ground.  Lawrence Timmons blew right by Sherrod Dezmond, but Dezmond saved face later when he outwrestled Bruce Davis.

Harrison, Summers, Johnson, and Redman were clearly the winners in this drill.

Once backs-on-backers was over, the Steelers moved to 11-on-11 drills.  On the very first play, Troy Polamalu intercepted a pass from Ben Roethlisberger.  Fans were happy to see this, since Polamalu has barely practiced since training camp started due to a hamstring injury.

Most of the excitement in the 11-on-11 drills was provided by WR Dallas Baker.  Baker didn’t excite the crowd with what he did.  Rather, the excitement came from what was done to him.

On one play, Charlie Batch completed a pass to Baker, only to have Baker get drilled by Tyrone Carter (did I mention that there is no real hitting or tackling in the 11-on-11 drill?).  A little later in the evening, rookie LB Andrew Schantz took a page out of Tyrone Carter’s book and clobbered Baker as he made another catch.  I don’t know what Baker did to anger the defense, but they were definitely teeing off on him.

In other news, Stefan Logans and Shaun McDonald took turns fielding punts.  Rookie Joe Burnett was noticeably absent from the drill.  Santonio Holmes has also been participating in punt return drills, but he too did not return any punts tonight.

Both kickers, Jeff Reed and Piotr Czech, were asked to kick progressively longer field goals.  Both kickers made their shorter kicks, but each finally missed on a 58 yard attempt.  Reed’s 58 yard attempt was on line but fell short.  Czech’s attempt had plenty of distance, but flew wide left.

Finally, the offensive  and defensive linemen broke off for blocking drills.  Neo (Tony Hills) successfully held off James Harrison on a bull rush.  He also stopped Arnold Harrison on a similar attempt.  Rookie Kraig Urbik held his own against Jordan Reffett, but was successfully bull rushed by  rookie DT Steve Mclendon.  Rookie Ramon Foster came up limping during the drill.  Not a good thing, with the offensive line already heavily depleted.  Lastly, first round pick Ziggy Hood pushed Jason Capizzi back so far on a bull rush that I thought they were going to credit him with a 2-point conversion.

The night ended with a fireworks display.  When the fireworks were over, the annual Steelers practice under the Friday night lights had come to a close.

To read more of my recent training camp reports, click the article below:

Steelers training camp update: 8/7/09

A perspective on Steelers training camp

Steelers training camp day 4

10 observations from Steelers training camp day 3

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8/7/09
By Donald Starver

Yesterday was a fairly uneventful day on the field at Latrobe.  The biggest news of the day actually happened off the field.  The Steelers finally announced that injured guard Darnell Stapleton will have arthroscopic surgery on his knee today.  Prior to this announcement, the Steelers and coach Tomlin had essentially avoided answering any questions about Stapleton’s status.

With center Justin Hartwig already missing practice due to a toe injury, Stapleton had moved into the starting center position at training camp. Now with both Hartwig and Stapleton out, Doug Legursky has moved into the center position with the first unit, while rookie A.Q. Shipley moves into the second unit.

Back-up tackle Trai Essex has moved into the right guard position that Stapleton filled for the final 15 games of last season.  The injuries to Hartwig and Stapleton leave the Steelers a bit short on offensive linemen at camp.

Other news from yesterday’s practice included the return of Hines Ward. Ward had been held out of practice since Saturday. Ward is not injured, but coach Tomlin has allowed him to skip practice to preserve Ward’s veteran legs, as well as to give the young receivers more reps at practice. While Ward was dressed for practice, he hardly did any practicing. I don’t think I actually saw him run any plays after warm-ups.

Troy Polamalu and Deshea Townsend were still sidelined nursing hamstring injuries. That may or may not be a problem. Last year, Polamalu missed almost all of training camp nursing a hamstring injury, and he ended up having possibly the best season of his pro career.

The Steelers’ quarterbacks and wide receivers continue to spend most of their time practicing short outlet passes. They have worked on these plays everyday of training camp. Perhaps the Steelers are finally acknowledging how well the New England Patriots utilize these short passes to Wes Welker. These short passes often serve as a de facto running game in the Patriots’ offense. Or perhaps the Steelers are using them as a bailout option when QB Ben Roethlisberger feels the rush coming. Either way, the amount of time being devoted to it says that we are going to be seeing more of these short passes than we’ve seen in the past.

Finally, the plays of the day were both turned in by rookie wide receiver Mike Wallace. On one play, Wallace had fellow rookie Keenan Lewis beat on a long pass play. The ball was under-thrown, and Lewis ran into Wallace and was called for pass interference on the play.

On a separate play near the end of practice, Wallace leaped high and came down with an acrobatic catch in the corner of the endzone on a pass from Dennis Dixon in the 2-minute drill. Wallace kept both feet in bounds and the crowd erupted in a thunderous roar. It was a perfect way to end practice.

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August 5, 2009
By Donald Starver

I attended Steelers training camp yesterday.  However, I was not able to take copious notes like I usually do.  The reason was that I had my precocious 5 year old nephew with me.  Try watching football practice when you are responsible for babysitting a 5 year old boy who has more energy than the Energizer Bunny.  He was much more interested in climbing on my back or going to McDonald’s than he was in watching the Steelers.

So rather than give my regular update of what went on at training camp yesterday, I thought that I would do something slightly different today.  I want to provide a perspective of what fans should and should not take from my (and other websites’) training camp reports.

Mike Tomlin has been very vocal about his opinion of “football in shorts”.  He thinks it is a good teaching tool, but is not particularly valuable for evaluating players.  I tend to agree with him.  However, there is a little bit of that perspective that also applies to training camp.  You see, training camp is not a true simulation of actual game conditions.

I have tried to share what I am seeing at training camp with those of you who are not able to make it to Latrobe.  I think that this is valuable inasmuch as most Steelers fans are not present at training camp.  After a long off-season, most fans are aching for some Steelers news.  I know that I certainly am.  Therefore, I try to bring you Steelers updates from training camp.

However, I have noticed from some of the comments that I have received, as well as some of the things that I have read on various Steelers message boards, that some fans do not quite understand what you can and cannot conclude merely by watching players in training camp.

I need to clarify that here at training camp, the players are not going at full speed.  There is no tackling going on, and minimal hitting.  After all, we wouldn’t want the players getting hurt before the season even starts.  Thus, when I report that a receiver made a good catch in traffic, fans need to understand that in an actual game situation the defenders would have leveled the player.  It is nice that the receiver held onto the ball in practice, but would he have held onto it if he had actually been hit by a safety while coming down with the ball?  Who knows?

Fans are constantly writing to me asking for my perspective on the offensive line.  Like all Steelers fans, I too am concerned about the offensive line.  However, the defense is not allowed to sack Big Ben right now.  Since they are not allowed to tackle Ben, it is hard to evaluate how the offensive line is doing.  There have been a few times when a defender has gotten to Ben completely unblocked.  That clearly indicated to me that there was a problem on the offensive line.  However, beyond those instances, it is hard to draw actual conclusions.  If Dick LeBeau were to turn the dogs loose and say “Get the quarterback”, then I could provide a much more accurate assessment of how the offensive line is doing.  But since the defense is not allowed to touch the quarterback, the defenders aren’t really going all out.

A few fans have written to me expressing their disappointment in Frank “the tank” Summers because he got leveled by Willie Gay.  It’s not fair to pass that judgment at this time.  There is no hitting going on at training camp, so Summers was not expecting Willie Gay to level him.  Frankly, that was the football equivalent of a sucker punch.  In my opinion, that incident made Willie Gay look bad, not Frank Summers.

There are some things that we CAN say definitively at this time.  For example:

• Big Ben has been throwing too many interceptions.  While I am sure he will work it out, Ben’s accuracy has been an issue.  But if you recall, he had the same  problem last year during camp and the preseason.
• Mike Wallace is fast.  It’s true that the defensive backs can’t hit him right now, but there is no rule preventing them from keeping up with him when he runs down the field.
• Dan Sepulveda is able to get nice distance on his punts, and appears to be 100% recovered.
• Piotr Czech and Jeff Reed can both kick for distance and accuracy.  This is making for an unexpected training camp battle.

Beyond those things, it is impossible to draw any definitive conclusions yet.  The real test is going to come on August 13th when the Steelers play their first pre-season game against the Arizona Cardinals.  That will be the first time the players are actually allowed to hit somebody.  Only then will we get our first true glimpse at how the offensive line is doing.

I will keep reporting from training camp.  However, I hope fans will now keep my reports in the proper perspective.  Steeler Nation can’t get enough of the Black and Gold, so I will continue reporting what I see.  However, perhaps I should start off these training camp reports with the same disclaimer that you see on those psychic hotline ads; “for entertainment purposes only”.

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Buzz up!

August 3, 2009
By Donald Starver

Today marked the fourth day of the Steelers 2009 training camp.  The crowd was blessed with great weather, and things are starting to get heated on the field.

The competition between the offense and the defense is starting to show, and several fights broke out today.  There was also some non-fight related contact that was harder than necessary.

A couple of players are starting to stand out to me.  They are:

Mike Wallace – This kid is a player.  He has caught passes along the sideline, made sliding catches, and beaten everybody deep (more than once).  Unless the sun explodes, he is going to make the team.  He may even shock the world and win the #3 receiver position.

Keenan Lewis - He has made nice plays everyday.  He always seems to be near the ball.  He has made a few interceptions, and deflected quite a few passes.

Tyler Grisham – I was the first one to write about this kid.  He probably won’t make the team, but if he keeps playing like he is, he may be kept on the practice squad.

David Johnson – Can’t catch very well, but he seems to be the most powerful blocker  among the tight ends.

Guys who have played poorly so far include:

Martin Nance – Drops too many passes.  He is in last place among the wide receivers.

Tony Hills – It’s hard to believe that this guy was an All-American in college.  He gets dominated far too often.  My new name for him is “Neo”.  You’ll see why later.

Joe Burnett – He is going to have to show something as a punt returner, because he keeps getting beat and dropping interceptions as a cornerback.

With that said, here are my notes from today’s practice.

-Hines Ward is in street clothes again.

-Team is doing casual drills in their respective units.

3:20PM – Horn sounds and the whole team comes together for team stretching and running.

-Casey Hampton walks through all of the running drills.  He takes a knee and talks during the stretches.  He doesn’t even get down with the other players and pretend to be stretching.  He just sat on his knees talking to the coaches.  I think he was afraid that if he layed down to stretch, he wouldn’t be able to get back up.

-Big Snack is not the only one who coasts during running and stretching drills.  Big Ben also walks while the other players are running/jogging.  However, he starts before the whistle blows each time, so he always finishes first.

3:31PM – Horn blows.  Team breaks up into offense and defense.  All units split up to work on drills.

-Quarterbacks and wide receivers have been working on LOTS of short outlet passes.  I think they are going to be a much more important part of the offense this year.  They’ve worked on them everyday so far.

-Dennis Dixon and Mike Reilly both have a very nice spin on their passes.  They throw a tight spiral.

-Big Ben actually throws the wobbliest spiral of any of the quarterbacks.  It’s a good thing he has a strong arm.

-Stefan Logan had been on the PUP list, but he is out there practicing today.

-Martin Nance drops his first pass.

-Once again, I’m impressed by WR Steven Black.  He has good size and good hands.

3:52PM – Defense and offense come together again.

-Dallas Baker beats William Gay for a nice reception across the middle.

-Mike Wallace beats Ike Taylor for a 20 yard reception and the crowd cheers.

-Tyler Grisham beats Ryan Mundy for a catch along the sideline.

-Shaun McDonald beats Ike Taylor across the middle, and Taylor pushes him to the ground HARD.  I don’t think Taylor liked getting beat.

-Mike Wallace beats Roy Lewis and Joe Burnett for a long pass.  He has 4 steps on both of them, and he would have had more if the ball hadn’t been under-thrown.

-Mike Reilly over-throws Limas Sweed on a long pass.  Limas could have had it, but he didn’t even put his hands up.

-Another wide open catch by Mike Wallace.  Is he THAT fast, or are the DBs that slow?

-Limas Sweed catches a pass from Big Ben and the crowd breathes a sigh of relief.

4:02 PM – Horn blows and offense & defense meet at the 20 yard line.

-1st team offense and 1st team defense take the field.

-Limas Sweed catches first pass.  A short out pass outlet pass from Big Ben.

-Dezmond Sherrod dives for a pass but drops it.

-Big Ben throws a pass that is almost intercepted by Anthony Madison.  The WR must have run the wrong route, because there was no WR in the area.

-Charlie Batch takes over and completes first pass to Martin Nance.

-Brandon Williams catches a short pass, but then puts a nice spin move on Joe Burnett that gains him an extra 10 yards.

-Keenan Lewis deflects a pass along the sidelines.

-Mike Wallace makes a nice sliding catch.

-Ryan Clark intercepts Charlie Batch’s pass across the middle.

-The Horn blows.

-Keiwan Ratliff, Joe Burnett, Shaun McDonald, Stefan Logan, Mewelde Moore and Santonio Holmes field punts.

-Isaac Redman wrestles Lawrence Timmons to the ground in a blocking drill.

-Andrew Schantz gets beat badly on a special teams blocking drill and gets yelled at by coaches.

-Tyler Grisham delivers a hard blow on Roy Lewis in a blocking drill.  Lewis meets him after the play and pats him on the butt.

-4:25 PM – 1st team offense and defense take the field again.

-James Farrior is in Ben Roethlisberger‘s face in a nanosecond.  If this were full contact, it would have been a sack.

-Willie Parker beats Lawrence Timmons on an out pattern and actually catches the ball.  The crowd goes wild.  (Note to those of you who are unaware: Willie Parker can’t catch).

-Rashard Mendenhall breaks a long run and the crowd cheers.

-Rookie safety Derrick Richardson dives to break up a pass to Martin Nance.  The crowd cheers.

-Dennis Dixon goes right back to Nance for a completion.

-Martin Nance drops a short pass from Dixon.

4:33 PM -  Horn blows.  Field goal team practices hurry-up drills.

-Jeff Reed boots a 48 yard field goal in 8-second drill.

-Reed boots a 56 yard field goal right throught the uprights.

4:40 PM – Offense and defense take the field again.

-Ben completes passes to Sweed, Holmes, and Mendenhall.

-Dallas Baker misses a long sideline pass from Roethlisberger.

-Joe Burnett makes a beautiful juggling interception off of Roethlisberger.  I believe that is Burnett’s first interception of training camp.

-Shaun McDonald beats Joe Burnett for a short reception.

-Chris Hoke has Tony Hills bent back so far in a blocking drill that it looks like Hills is doing the limbo dance.  The technique is actually effective.  Hoke is so surprised to be dominating a blocker this badly that he falls down.  Coaches take Hills aside and talk to him.

Or perhaps Hills was practicing his bullet dodging technique like Neo in The Matrix.

-Tyrone Carter puts a hard hit on rookie WR Mike Wallace, but Wallace holds onto the ball and the crowd cheers.

4:51 PM – Dennis Dixon takes over.  Dixon completes first pass to Tyler Grisham.  Dixon and Grisham are becoming quite a duo.

-Mike Reilly throws 2 incomplete passes.  He is 0-2.

4:54 PM – Offense and defense take field for 11-on-11 drills.

-Charlie Batch over-throws Shaun McDonald on a long pass.

-Tony Hills gets into a fight with a defender.  I can’t see who it is.  Mr. Smith maybe?

-Charlie Batch over-throws Brandon Williams on a long pass.

That is pretty much all that happened in camp today.  If you want to hear about a particular player, leave a comment and let me know.

If you haven’t read my recap of Day 2 click here.

If you haven’t read my recap of Day 3 click here.

See you guys tomorrow.

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Buzz up!

Today’s practice started out with a big crowd, but most left when the skies opened up and it started raining cats and dogs.

Since it was raining so much, I didn’t get to take as many notes as I normally would (my notebook got soaked).  I couldn’t take as many pictures either.  But here are my top 10 observations from Day 3 (Sunday August 2, 2009).

1)  Hines Ward did not practice today.  I don’t know if he was injured or if coach Tomlin is just giving him a rest.  However, he wasn’t in pads.  He just had on shorts and a t-shirt.  He was wearing a baseball cap turned backwards.

2)  If you ever wondered if the Steelers practice in the rain, the answer is “yes”.  It started raining really hard in the middle of practice.  A few of the players started to leave the field.  Someone on the field yelled that they saw lightning.  Coach Mike Tomlin yelled back “We play games in the rain in the NFL”, and that was that.  Nobody left the field, and practice proceeded as usual.

I don’t know about anyone else, but I absolutely love the control that Mike Tomlin exercises over his team.  He absolutely will not let them lose focus.  It definitely inspires confidence in me as a fan that the Steelers will not become distracted for any reason.

3)  Dan Sepulveda is back!!!! If there were any question about how Dan Sepulveda is healing from his injury/surgery from last season, let me put your mind at rest.  Sepulveda is back 100%!!!!!!  I actually asked Sepulveda how he was feeling yesterday, and he told me 100%.  However, I needed to see it myself.

Today Sepulveda punted for the first time at open practice.  He boomed punts that all seemed to hang in the air for 6 seconds (no exaggeration).  He probably made 10 punts.  The shortest one went 47 yards in the air.  The longest one went 67 yards in the air.  There was a slight wind at his back, but still, 67 yards is awesome.  By the way, did I mention that it was 67 yards in the rain?

4)  Mike Wallace is fast.  He got behind the entire defense for a long reception from Big Ben.  He beat the defenders so badly that it looked like Tom Brady to Randy Moss.

5)  Don’t ignore Piotr Czech.  Jeff Reed is an amazing kicker, and I hope the Steelers sign him to an extension.  However, today at practice Piotr Czech got to kick field goals.  He started with an extra point, and then moved back 5 yards on each successive kick.  He never missed.  The coaches stopped the drill after he hit a 55 yarder.  Frankly, I wanted to see him attempt a 60 yarder.

6)  Ziggy Hood beat Kraig Urbick twice in a row in one-on-one drills.  He looked like he totally outclassed Urbick.  However, Urbick stopped him cold on the third try, and the crowd erupted in cheers.

7)  Martin Nance drops too many catchable balls.  I know that he was Ben Roethlisberger’s favorite receiver at Miami of Ohio, but I just can’t see him making this team.

8)  Limas Sweed is showing good signs.  Limas made several pretty catches, including a nice diving catch by the sidelines that made the crowd go wild.  However, Limas also had some drops that drew a few jeers from the crowd.

9)  I like the way Mike Tomlin lets his assistants do their job.  Each Assistant runs practice for their particular unit.  Tomlin then circulates through the units and watches what they’re doing.  At each unit, he singles out a player and shouts encouragement to him.  When he got to the tight ends, he yelled out “C’mon DJ, show me something.  Show me what you got, DJ”.  He was referring to rookie tight end David Johnson.

I noticed that when Tomlin is watching a particular unit, the players go at it just a little bit harder.  The wide receivers in particular tend to dive for balls that they would have let fall to the ground if Tomlin weren’t watching.  The running backs also seem to hit the holes harder when Tomlin is watching.

10)  Frank “the tank” Summers is already a fan favorite.  Practice ended today when Summers had a violent (and loud) collision with a defender on a running play.  Summers didn’t win this one.  He got knocked on his back.  I couldn’t see who the defender was, but those around me said that his number ended in a “5″.  They thought it was either Patrick Bailey (#55) or Donovan Woods (#95).  The play drew ooohs and ahhhs from both fans and other players on the field.  It looked like a fight was going to break out, and I saw coaches jump in.  Tempers cooled, and practice ended.

Note: I was wrong about the hit on Frank Summers yesterday.  According to the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, it was Willie Gay who put the big hit on Summers.  In fact, he knocked Summers down with the hit.  Read about it here.

If you haven’t already read our coverage of Day #2, please click below:

Notes from Steelers training camp Day 2

Also see our coverage of Day 4 by clicking here.

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