Still crazy after all these years

… Sunday Night Football decimated it A few years ago, Donald Trump tried to destroy the National Football League. He failed — and on Sunday night, Trump witnessed his first Washington Nationals game and saw first-hand how far Major League Baseball has fallen. He attended Game 5 between the Nationals and the Houston Astros, and the game became the fifth lowest-rated World Series game in history. Fox broadcast had a rating of 6.5 and trailed NBC’s broadcast of the Green Bay Packers-Kansas City Chiefs by about 60 percent. The World Series thus far has recorded four of the lowest-rated games in history. As Sports Media Watch noted after Sunday’s game, Already on a record-low pace, World Series ratings were hammered by the NFL Sunday night. Sunday’s Astros-Nationals World Series Game 5 averaged a 6.5 rating and 11.39 million viewers on FOX, marking the lowest-rated and least-watched Game 5 of the Fall Classic on record. The previous lows were a 7.3 and 12.64 million for Royals-Giants in 2...

... but he finally won a challenge Without a doubt, Pittsburgh Steelers fans had reason to be disgusted with their football team on Monday Night Football. How in the world can their team fall two touchdowns behind the most woeful franchise in professional football? However, the derisive chants and boos were not directed at quarterback Mason Rudolph, though he had a terrible start … nor were they directed at the offensive line, which was not doing a very good job … nor were they directed at the vaunted defense, which is probably overrated, and looked like a seize. Instead, the disgust was general, and who is responsible for such a woeful performance? Yes, media knuckleheads like the infamous Booger McFarland were blaming Rudolph for the boos, but he was coming off a concussion protocol and had not played in three weeks. They could be patient if that was just the reason. Instead, the reality is that the Steeler fans’ patience with Coach Mike Tomlin is fading fast. It has been over th...

… but things are not pretty A few weeks ago, a Pittsburgh newspaper columnist wrote a piece with this headline: “2019 has been one of worst Pittsburgh sports years.” At the time, the Steelers were 0-4 going into a Monday night game against the Cincinnati Bengals. However, things did look grim. It has definitely not been pretty. They have improved somewhat for the Steelers, but his basic premise is still possible, I ’m dying to flip the calendar to 2020. Because 2019 has been one of the worst Pittsburgh sports years in recent memory. In fact, unless the Steelers turn things around and scramble to make the playoffs, 2019 will go down as the first time in 13 years that Pittsburgh didn’t see a single playoff victory from any of its three professional sports teams. Tim Benz, Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, Sept. 28, 2019 For me, the worst news is the Pirates, who have not won a World Series title since 1979. They did have shots at getting there in the 1990s, but Jim Leyland was not Danny Mur...

Le'Veon the Loser … Steelers drafted him despite character issues I'm thinking I'm going to show everybody. I’m going to show people that, look, Pittsburgh had something special and they let it go. That's what I'm going to go out there and do. Le’Veon Bell to USA Today prior to 2019 season In life, we make choices, and they often affect whether aspects of that become positive or negative. One problem with contemporary Americans is that they do not want to acknowledge the damage that mistakes can cause. Professional athletes are often in that group. Just like Le’Veon Bell. In short, Bell has become a loser in almost every respect, but he is still bitter about what life has done to him — while not acknowledging his own role in his downfall. Background Today, Le’Veon Bell is a member of the New York Jets after playing five years for the Pittsburgh Steelers. He played well for the Steelers, coming close to or over 2,000 yards rushing and receiving on three occas...

... and Mike Tomlin must demonstrate his worth While many fans of the Pittsburgh Steelers may have given up on the 2019 season, they really have a little room for optimism. However, the Steelers will need some big wins and some consistency, something that Mike Tomlin’s team has been missing over the past few years. They are good at racking up wins over weak teams, but not against the powers — the Patriots win last year being one exception. And they have been generally woeful in the playoffs since their last Super Bowl appearance with essentially players from the Bill Cowher era. Hope is still present Nevertheless, I do believe that the Steelers have a path to the playoffs this year, with little room for error. Remember that the four losses that they have are to teams that have a collective record of 22-4 right now, and three of those games were winnable. Here is that path. First, they must win next week’s game against the winless Dolphins on Monday Night. [What a horrible Monday ...

... Arians, Haley, and Fichner As a former offensive coordinator and play-caller as a head coach, I realize that you can call some great plays — and you make some calls that stink. It is the nature of the business. However, after watching very few Steelers games last year because I now reside in the Upper Midwest — though I have tried to get coverage — I still have an opinion of Randy Fichner’s play-calling. Last year was Fichner’s first opportunity to call plays in the NFL. I saw a few games on TV, but primarily listened to the games. Even on radio, I questioned many things last year. This season, he has been worse. In 2018, he allowed Ben Roethlisberger to change plays at will, so he passed the ball two-thirds of the time despite having a strong running game. The offense had no real balance, particularly at the end when they lost four out of five games from late November through late December, including embarrassing failures at Denver and Oakland. Now, with the loss of Roethlisberg...

… NFLPA pledges support, hurts unions for real workers In their arrogant quest to push the envelope to the extremes, Coach Bill Bellichick of the New England Patriots and owner Robert Kraft have demonstrated that they will do anything to win. Spygate, Deflate-gate and other shady deals will forever stain the legacy of that franchise. A prime example of how this is finally coming back to hurt them in the pocket book — as well as again diminishing their reputations — is the Antonio Brown saga. They figured that Brown, a sleazy but very talented player, could lead them to the promised land this year. Charles Robinson of Yahoo Sports outlined what happened and how it is going to hurt them despite their hopes to recoup some of the money that Antonio Brown has cost them. And Robinson explained in the story that if they had just held back on Brown after learning about the latest charges of sexual assault against a Central Michigan friend, they might have been able to escape from this with...

… most wins now: 9 When a team is 0-3, a win is a win is a win — regardless of the opponent. However, the Steelers’ 27-3 victory over the Bengals gave the fans some hope. I was one of them, and we had some reason for hope — and some reasons for concern. The positives were simple: First-year starting QB Mason Rudolph had a quarterback rating of about 125, which was great. He completed 24 of 28 passes for 229 yards and two touchdowns. Most important, he was not sacked at all, and he threw no interceptions. [In the wildcat, Jaylen Samuels had three shovel passes to James Conner to pad those passing stats to a 87.2 completion rate and 31 more yards.] Second, the defense had eight sacks. Forget about the fact that the Bengals were 0-3 coming into the game. Any time that a defense records eight sacks is a good one. Third, the Steelers found a way to take the pressure off of Rudolph, and I liked the ingenuity of the Wildcat. It showed that both James Conner and Jaylen Samuels can still ru...