Former Steelers

Did anyone notice how solid Dotson played for the Rams, I still don't understand why they soured on him so soon. Maybe it was coming into camp overweight.

Witherspoon was making some plays for the Rams and he barely got on the field with the Steelers.
There have been lots of others that have gone on to accomplish pretty well nothing after leaving the Steelers.
But Dotson and Witherspoon seam to have found their game with the Rams, is it better coaching .

 

Sometimes people need to be ****caned or slapped in the face to wake up

 

The same Witherspoon that couldn't stay healthy and got beat by AJ Brown for three TDs .

 

then you have DJ, sutton, edmunds, okrafor.

 

It helps that the Rams are using him at his natural position on the right side.... position flexibility is a nice pet to have, but using a player where he's most comfortable means a lot..... during his rookie season, while playing the right side, he was easily our best lineman... this is absolutely a coaching issue and we deserved to lose him

 

Johnny Unitas
Mike Vrabel
Kenny Pickett
Mickey Spillane

 

Witherspoon is still bad... idk. He made some plays for us, but he hasn't had some career renaissance. Dotson has though, and I think it probably stems from moving back to his natural position on the right side. He mentioned a few times that he is a better RG than LG, but we wanted him to continue playing LG. He was decent here, but never reached the level we thought he could. He reached it in LA, mainly due to being able to play RG... Hargrave and Feiler have had good careers outside PGH too. Hargrave was a cap thing, as he was good here too, but Feiler was let go in favor of others and he was a good player for a few years. Emmanuel Sanders was great for SF and Denver.

Some players thrive in other situations and others don't. Chuks found his way out of the league pretty quickly. Same with Claypool. DJ is trying to kill his own career pretty hard right about now. Dupree wasn't who he was in Pittsburgh elsewhere, Mike Wallace and Santonio Holmes too, Le'Veon Bell, AB, etc.

I think we have to look at all the players that left and not just the ones that did well. While it sucks to see Dotson be good on another team when we need talent at OL, there isn't some large influx of situations where players suck here, leave, then all of the sudden become good. At least not more than it happens anywhere else.

 

Mike Hylton will look nice in the slot, could possibly be had.

 

James Conner has held his own in AZ slightly outperforming Najee the past 2 years - meaning that it was essentially a cut and replace position player, despite all the accolades and anticipation of drafting Harris high in the draft. Conner showed real grit coming out of college after his setbacks and has been quite serviceable for the Cards after leaving Pgh.

Harris 2024 - 1043 yds; 4.0 avg; 36 receptions; 6 TDs
Conner 2024 - 1094 yds; 4.6 avg; 47 receptions; 8 TDs

Harris 2023 - 1035 yds; 4.1 avg; 29 receptions; 8 TDs
Conner 2023 - 1040 yds; 5.0 avg; 27 receptions; 7 TDs

 

Problem with Conner was that he couldn't stay healthy.

 

Speaking of Conner let’s not forget that Kelvin Beachum is blocking for him. Old guy is still better than the tackles we have playing for us. He’s a textbook example of someone who benefited from good coaching

 

Najee would have better stats if he didn't have to split time with Warren.

 

Or Conner with Murray? Still kind of a push.

Murray - 572 yds
Warren - 511 yds (would Harris have gained this many if they were his carries?)

The point about Conner oft injured is true but he seems to have done OK the past 2 seasons. All I'm saying is it's been almost even-steven with the 2 runners the past 2 years with a slight edge to Conner stat speaking.

 

Mike or Paris?

 

And the Steelers would be worse for it.

 

I think Harris could've gained another 200-300 yards per season, he ran for 1,200 as a rookie behind a terrible OL.

 

Or not have a “player’s coach” running things.

 

Dotson was horrid today.

 

You're going to ruin the narrative that the Steelers traded away such a great player.

 

He is a good player. He was a penalty machine for us. He improved under McVay some but he still commits a lot of penalties comparably. I don't blame the Steelers for moving on one bit. He was one player. Not gonna make or break this team.

 

My post was sarcasm

 

Comparing the last 4 years:

726 carries for Connor. 1097 carries for Najee.

57 games played for Connor. 68 games played for Najee.


While the averages may be similar, Najee's real superpower is his durability. The guy is a workhorse.

 

Keeping in the theme of many recent posts, you have to ask: was it the player or the coaching? There are not very many players that leave the Steelers and go downhill..... Unless you count the basket cases who just lose it mentally like brown..... But there are a good few that improve and some even become great players elsewhere.

 

Mostly our offensive players. Guys like AB, Bell, Bryant, Wallace, Claypool, a lot of offensive players left the Steelers and were out of the league fairly quickly.
Some of our defenders went down as well like Edmunds and Sutton. I don't know what that percentage looks like compared to other tenured coaches but it does happen.