Draw A Center Line

[LakecrestSteeler]

A buddy of mine made this observation, which I thought was a pretty good football observation. It works for some other field sports too. I had never heard it before and it is probably not original, but boy you can see it being a glaring problem with the Steelers!

Line up the Steelers Offense against the Steelers defense and draw a center line connecting the RB, QB, C, NG, MLB, and Safety; then evaluate that talent!

Our center line has been just awful the last couple seasons and really hasn’t been stellar since Shazier’s injury.

The Steelers really need to focus on the centerline and some of the moves we are all familiar with have just been horrible.

1.) Ben’s final years were done in by having no transition plan, taking garbage for the actual Center position in the draft and lastly missing a quality RB since at least Conner.

2.) Nose Guard: you might say this has been hosed up since Chris Hoke? The experts say the Casey Hampton types aren’t useful anymore. Still feels like the same game to me when King Henry just ran all over us. I’dbe willing to go back and try a Hampton or Wilfork type of body to solidify the centerline above.

3.) we all no the struggles with the MLB part of this centerline equation. Has been an issue since Shazier’s injury. The Bish years really set us back!

4.) Safety play from the Free Safety or Strong Safety has been a hot mess since Clark. We got maybe 2 quality years out of Fitz? Just a glaring hole right now where nobody seems to do anything well. Pass protection mediocre and run support mediocre.

Our centerline is hot garbage at this point in time and needs to be addressed. Getting Watt might have caused Steeler defensive coaches to get too enamored with his skill set and talent that they took their eyes off the centerline.

Having sub par Centers causes offensive coaches to look to running over tackles too much or jet sweeps.

The organization really needs to overhaul our centerline!

[SteelerDayTrader]

Strong up the middle wins football games has long been a dictum

I see the Steelers like this


RB
2 change ups and 1 rock pounder is just not enough to succeed doing what the Steelers want to do

QB
Easily the weakest QB unit in the NFL

C
Fat drunk and stupid is no way to go through life son

NT
We will see. Currently the Steelers do not have a dominant NT on the roster

ILB
Fair. Maybe ok. Not great

SS
Not great

FS
Not great

[jebrick]

Fan want a NT. Tomlin and the NFL devalue them. This draft was loaded with NTs and the Steelers did not take one. Get over it

[StillerInCT]

They refer to it as the Spine in soccer (GK, Central defender, Defensive Mid, Attacking Mid, Striker). The overall idea is that you would have most of your experience/leadership or talent in those positions because it will give solidity to what you're trying to do.

[gojira5150]

Strong up the middle wins football games has long been a dictum

This is true in softball as well. My daughters play and it starts up the middle. Pitcher, Catcher, SS, CF. My daughters are pitchers and when colleges start recruiting Pitchers always get the most in scholarship money. My oldest received a full scholarship as she could pitch. She had 5 pitches (Fast, Curve, Riser, Drop & Off Speed) to use and can put on location.

[.Kodiak]

This illustrates why Tomlin is doomed to ever win anything more than a lucky playoff game or two.

It's almost impossible in today's NFL to build a defense that matches up favorably with everyone. Load up to stop the run, and passing teams destroy you. Favor the pass too much, and running teams destroy you. This is parity in the NFL - it's very hard to build a truly dominant unit.

Which means sometimes you have to be able to outscore teams your defense matches up poorly with. But Tomlin will never embrace that, even when the writing on the wall is crystal clear. We are ALWAYS going to see an offense in the playoffs capable of putting 30+ on us (which, these days, seems like just about any playoff team). If we don't come out swinging trying to score points, we will continue to get buried.

[anpsteel]

I don’t pay much attention attention to how other teams that run a base 34 stop the run when in passing subsets


But for the Steelers, this has always been a problem. Even under Cowher teams would lineup in passing personnel groups, forcing the Steelers into nickel and run on them

The inherent challenge of the Steelers 3-4 scheme, once your Casey Hampton comes off the field, unless you have a Levon Kirkland or a speed freak like Ryan Shazier, your existing inside linebackers are not built or capable of performing that role

Elandon Roberts was the closest they’ve come, but being a thumper wasn’t sufficient to overcome his deficiencies in coverage

Where I am going with this, is that it isn’t that fans don’t think we need a nose tackle

It’s that we know they will not use the nose tackle

Until they find another physical outlier, whether in the Kirkland or Shazier form, they really need to find a way to keep three down lineman on the field, even in passing subsets.

Maybe Especially in passing subsets. You can’t expect your 200 pound safeties to continue to lead the team and tackles because of your front seven deficiencies in passing subsets

I’ve been saying this for years, and of course, for years nothing has changed

Until Tomlin figures this out, the Steelers defense will always have that inherent weakness

Practically irrespective of who the people on the field are.

Outliers like Kirkland and Shazier are extraordinarily rare

[anpsteel]

This illustrates why Tomlin is doomed to ever win anything more than a lucky playoff game or two.

It's almost impossible in today's NFL to build a defense that matches up favorably with everyone. Load up to stop the run, and passing teams destroy you. Favor the pass too much, and running teams destroy you. This is parity in the NFL - it's very hard to build a truly dominant unit.

Which means sometimes you have to be able to outscore teams your defense matches up poorly with. But Tomlin will never embrace that, even when the writing on the wall is crystal clear. We are ALWAYS going to see an offense in the playoffs capable of putting 30+ on us (which, these days, seems like just about any playoff team). If we don't come out swinging trying to score points, we will continue to get buried.

This is certainly true

One of the things that I feel Tomlin misses

Is he looks for a sideline a sideline linebacker that’s capable in coverage and quick enough in pursuit

He looks to combine that role with another player whose role is design designed primarily to stop the run

What he fails to understand, is both of your linebackers need to have sufficient speed and size to stop the run and play in coverage and neither of them should come off the field in passing subsets

Particularly if you’re not going to keep three down lineman on the field