Big Ben is on the decline

I'd write one giving him kudos for speaking his mind and trying to light a fire under his guys.

 

This is crazy talk! The parts around him are subpar right now. Ben is still elite and still in his prime.

If we lose tomorrow, I would think seriously about getting Ben out of this season in one piece... Max protect and just run the ball. He is taking too many shots. Maybe sit him a few games and let other QB's get hit.

 

We all know Ben wouldn't last forever, and now that he's into double digits of his NFL career all of those hits and the frustration of never having an OL that can block for him is catching up. You can see it in his play; letting passing sail on him, short hopping throws, the slamming of helmets, yelling at his receivers. He'll never admit it on camera but the dude is only human and if I was him I'd be pissed off too. He takes them to 3 super bowls, helps them win two of them and the front office cannot find him a line to keep him upright to save their life.

His play style and the lack of blocking will certainly shorten his career so we can only hope he's able to put together a few more seasons of solid football before he completely falls apart.

Not to even mention that he loved BA and he clearly, no matter what he says, does not like Fire Haley's offense.

 

I think teams worry about him and who he has to throw to more than most here realize.

We do need to get him more Wallace/Wheaton types.

There a good bit left in the tank IMO

 

What makes you think he doesn't do that? This isn't the 70's, QBs do not call their own plays unless the defense gives a certain look and then they audible. Russell Wilson is over rated, he has a superior offensive line and if you don't believe it just look at the difference in Marshawn Lynch, he was washed up which is how he ended up in Seattle. Wilson has legs and improvises with his running ability like an RGlll, but RGlll has skills as a pocket passer, don't worry, the league is learning the pistol formation, look at how well Kapernick is doing this year. My point is a good OC can make a QB look really good but utilizing his skill set, BA did it by having a blocking scheme that you couldn't run the ball with but it also kept guys from coming straight up the middle most of the time and that gave Ben an escape route when the edge rushers beat the tackles. Haley wants a precision game but when the guard gets blown up and blocks the passing lane it takes the quick slant away and the same thing with the back coming out into the flat, instead of being a safety valve he ends up having to help block eliminating one of the check downs, there are too many things that Ben can't overcome. Has he made bad throws, yes, has he made bad decisions and help put this team in the current position? Absolutely!! But is it entirely his fault? No, not even close. We've had a bad oline for a long time but this is the worst one ever put on the field and I think it is because they don't know how to execute the zone blocking scheme when teams blitz, it is obvious watching the games. The bears got to Ben on the first blitz and it only took that one blitz to realize that the linemen couldn't pick it up so every snap a blitz comes, just like the Titans game and the bungles, we can't stop the blitz and it gets there in a hurry. On the other side of the ball we blitz and can't get there, the way to be a short passing game is by playing man coverage to disrupt the timing, it is why the Jets were always giving the cheatriots fits when they had Revis because the man coverage forced Brady to hold on to the ball and they would get sacks. We lack the DBs to do that so when the blitz comes the CB is 10 or 12 yards off his guy, the QB simply throws it to the WR who then gets 5 to 8 yards just by taking a single step and catching the ball, you can't get sacks when the QB always has someone to throw the ball to, simple. There are a number of problems on both sides of the ball, too many that there isn't a QB or a coach or anyone else can fix over night, this is going to take 4 or 5 mediocre seasons with good draft picks to overcome the lousy picks we got the last 5 years.

 

On the decline? How can you even tell? We have the league's worst running attack and O line. The middle of the line is a defensive freeway on passing plays. We have half of a tight end. I can't even judge how Ben is because the rest of the offense is that bad right now.

 

To keep blaming the Oline and saying the FO did nothing is a cop-out. Fact is this team has been addressing the Oline. We have been picking guys and the entire steeler nation gets excited. We have 2 first rounders in Pouncey and DeCastro, both of whom were highly acclaimed in the draft and supposed to be great. These are guys most Steeler nation wanted out of the draft. We have 2 second rounders, one of which was a first round talent (Adams) who dropped to the second round due to other non-football related issues. People on this board claim our Oline could not even be back-ups on other teams, yet when guys like Colon go to other teams, they start and play pretty well for them, heck even Urbick went on to play alot and not do that bad, but he was not good enough for us to even keep.

Maybe it is actually our coaching and maybe is is just really hard to block for Ben because they never know what he is doing, and he rarely gets the ball out fast. Did everyone see how fast Cutler was getting rid of the ball. Both Cutler and Rogers have played behind horrid Oline, yet they made changes to their game to help the Oloine out. I do not think we do that. Their is a coaching issue when we bring in a guy off the street and he immediately plays as well as our Probowl 1st Round center, and even goes on to start teaching blocking schemes to our linemen. That speaks volumes to the coaching we have, imo.

We have drafted alot of 1st round talent over the yeas for the offense, yet it always underperforms: We have a franchinse QB, 2 first rounders on the line, a first round TE, and we had a first round RB (Mendenhall). We had Holmes, Burress, yet let them go...

We have several players taking up a huge amount of the cap (esp QB) - this is where SF and Seattle are currently saving a ton (for now).

I want to know how Baltimore does what they do. How were they able to go get boldin? How did they get Leach? How did they get Smith to replace Ray-Ray and we get stuck with Foote? How do they get Dumerville? How do they get Canty? How do they do all this and still pay Flacco?

 

Yet, we most likely win the last game without the 5 turnovers...

 

They just started to pay Flacco and if I remember correctly, his cap hit this year isn't much.
http://profootballtalk.nbcsports.com/2013/03/04/flaccos-cap-numbers-stay-low-in-2013-and-2014/
Their hell is coming in 2016 and beyond.

Also how many games have Pouncey and DeCastro been healthy? This is essentially DD's first year.

Did you miss the article posted earlier this week where it showed that Ben was getting the ball out at an average of 2.5 seconds vs Cutlers 2.2 seconds last week

 

True, the TO killed but you have to be able to score points first before worrying about turnovers.