Former Super Bowl winner Ryan Clark: Steelers are “a total organizational failure”; it is the “end of an era”

Ryan Clark as a DB for the Steelers

… can this be changed?


Is everyone, from Steeler players to the the local and national media, wrong about the team that has won six Super Bowls but appears to be on the brink of becoming a bottom-tier NFL team?


One of its former defensive standouts does not think so. Ryan Clark has watched the formerly proud Pittsburgh Steelers plummet from a top-tier team to one that has lost to the Raiders and the Bengals — at home — on successive weekends. 


In fact, they lost to the perennial cellar-dwelling Cincinnati Bengals by two touchdowns last week, revealing a tremendous amount of ineptitude from to top of the organization to the bottom. 


Former Super Bowl winner


In a panel discussion on ESPN, Clark, who played for the Steelers from 2006 to 2013 and earned a Super Bowl ring in 2009, was blunt about his assessment of the failure of the team after the loss to Cincinnati,


It’s an end of an era, an end of an era of dominance, it’s an end of an era of actually having a Super Bowl window … this is a total organizational failure. 


I took a lot of heat when the Steelers traded for Minkah Fitzpatrick which has worked out from the free safety position, but they needed that pick because they needed a way to figure out a succession plan for Ben Roethlisberger.


And they didn’t. And they still don’t. The best teams are able to move right into the next quarterback. The best teams that keep competing can do that. The Pittsburgh Steelers cannot.


Ryan Clark, ESPN, September 26, 2021


What makes Clark particularly credible is that he was one of the defensive players who was secured when Bill Cowher was still coach, but then appeared in two Super Bowls, the last appearance being a loss to the Green Bay Packers 11 seasons ago. 


Asks if Tomlin will have a losing season


Thus, when Clark questions what Mike Tomlin has done with the team, and where it is today, he has a cachet that most commentators do not,


They always say, “Mike Tomlin has never had a losing season. I don’t know if that changes this year, but if it does, now you have to look at the Pittsburgh Steelers and say, “Are they better than the Cincinnati Bengals. Not the Ravens. Not the Browns. The Bengals.


Ryan Clark, ESPN September 26, 2021


Perhaps Tomlin can turn things around this year, but with a trip to Green Bay on the horizon this weekend, and with the Packers finally starting to play like a top-tier team after starting out woefully, things do not look good. 


I will talk about the Fitzpatrick trade later, but for now, things are not peaches and cream in the Steeler offices in Pittsburgh, nor in many homes and hamlets in Western Pa.


Which is a shame — but as I have been saying for a while, it has been heading in this direction for years. 

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