Are the Steelers really a "Jekyl and Hyde" football team?

They may need Dr. Phil

While many Pittsburgh Steeler fans are calling their team a "Jekyl and Hyde" outfit, one that performs very well one week and putridly the next, the use of that word is not fair to author Robert Louis Stevenson.

Stevenson created these two (or one) character(s). He wrote "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyl and Mr. Hyde" more as a statement about morality than about the inner turmoil of woeful/wonderful athletic teams. 

However, the root of that story focuses on the idea of a split personality, which psychiatrists call "dissociative identity disorder." Since I know little about psychiatry or about Sigmund Freud, I can try to talk about the Steelers in laymen's terms of that split personality instead of dissociative identity disorder.

First, teams really do not have a personality. Perhaps a "peoplenality," but not a person. They adopt a peoplenality because they have so many individuals on a team.

However, teams do have a collective image that comes from within their psyche. They must work together and take advantage of their skills and abilities to work toward a common goal. That requires leadership and character, and that is where the Steelers are struggling. 

When the team lost to a woeful Jets aggregation on Nov. 9, the fingers were pointed at the coaches, the quarterback, the defense, even the player personnel guy.

For instance, Ben Roethlisberger looked like he was all-world in back to back wins over the Colts and then the Ravens. He threw 12 touchdown passes in those two games, the only QB in history to do so. Then Ben threw more picks (2) than TDs (1) against the Jets to go along with one pick and one TD on Monday against Tennessee.

Does Ben have a split personality? What about the team?

Well, if you talk about leadership and character being part of a personality, it may have some influence on it.

Late in the Tennessee game, which turned out being a win, running back LaGarrette Blount decided that he was ticked off because he was not playing more. He had been taken off the return team in favor of younger players. In addition, Le'Veon Bell was having a career night with 204 rushing yards. Giving Blount carries on a night like that would have been crazy since the Steelers had to charge back from 11 points down to win the game. 

Athletes must simply keep their heads on the most important tasks ahead of them. Take the case of Roethlisberger and his leading receiver Antonio Brown.  His QB's rating has been sporadic. He hit 150 against the Colts, but was just 64 in losses to the Ravens and the Browns. Last week, he was 82 against the Jets and 81 against Tennessee. 

Brown is not a leader. He leads the NFL in receiving yards with 1,070 yards, but he shows his character defects when he makes a catch and goes through some ridiculous circus antics after the catch. He does that whether his team is winning or losing. He has already been flagged for his antics, but he continues to do them when his team is down by 14 points. That reflects on him and his coach.

Brown is a great receiver, but he went into the tank against the Jets. He had eight catches for 74 yards, but he also lost two fumbles that were costly for his team.

This was not the major character issue for the team. Earlier this season, the Steelers had two tokers who were arrested while smoking some weed in a car an hour before leaving to fly to Philadelphia for a preseason game. Bell and Blount were not disciplined publicly by Coach Mike Tomlin for that, although they will be handled both in criminal court and by the NFL commissioner. 

That may have led Tomlin to cut Blount as quickly as he did on Tuesday. Nevertheless, Tomlin's discipline has been a topic of concern for many Steeler followers. 

Those antics show a lack of character, and that could help the split personality. 

The Steelers have played through the cup-cake part of their schedule. That included Tampa Bay (2-8), the Jets (2-8), Jacksonville (1-8), Carolina (3-7-1), and Tennessee (2-8). Totals? (10-39-1, .256).

They have two games left with the Bengals (6-3-1), who have been up and down, one with the Saints (4-6), who have woefully underachieved; one in Atlanta (4-6), and one with the red-hot Chiefs who are tied with Denver at 7-3. 

So, perhaps the Steelers should take a turn on the coach in Dr. Phil's studio. They are definitely a case study for the ages. Even Freud would agree.