they fired Arians too late

It wasn't an "effort" at providing stats. I did provide stats. You have decided to provide a different, "meaningless" set of stats (passes to TEs, rushing yards) that aren't really part of the argument. But I guess, good for Bruce, Ben threw a TD pass to Weslye Saunders. YAY!

I'll take the 7+ more pts per game.

But again: this is a ridiculously low sample and we can't draw many conclusions from it. You are using the eyeball test. Well, I have that too: how about open receivers to throw to? How about a WIDE OPEN Miller in the end zone in that Jets game, a terrificly, well-designed play, the likes of which we NEVER saw from Arians.

As for 3-0 vs 1-2...the defense gave up 19 total points in those Arians' wins. That sorta helps, doesn't it? And don't give Arians' O credit for Brown's punt return TD against Cincy.

 

I think one of the things we are gonna just have to come to terms with is that maybe.....this....is....now....a....I can't saaaaaaaayyyy it.... a.... passing....lea....NOOOOOOOO! LOL.

 

Still, as I pointed out earlier, the teams with imbalanced attacks that are WAY more tilted to passing than running, are 7-17 through the first three weeks (including us).

As all of the former players on ESPN (guys who actually played in the league for years) will tell you, you've gotta be able to run the ball in the postseason.

Art Rooney recognizes this. It was his executive order while bringing Haley in. "Run the ball!" Through three games, it's a 35:20 Pass:Run ratio. Insubordination.

 

A weird stat that I heard tonight was the the Seahawks are the only team in the league with more rushing yards than passing yards. In this day and age that is pretty crazy I would say. You would just figure that in this modern era that stat wouldn't happen. That being said I did want BA to go but I wasn't exactly sure about Haley. But now that I've seen that him and Ben can coexist and we are using Heath in the red zone a lot more instead of just as a possession receiver I like what he is doing. I think all would be well in thesteelersfan.com land if our d wasn't stinking up the joint week after week. To put up 31 and lose is demoralizing. But AB needs to hold on to the ball and so does Dwyer as well.

 

It wasn't an "effort" at providing stats. I did provide stats. You have decided to provide a different, "meaningless" set of stats (passes to TEs, rushing yards) that aren't really part of the argument. But I guess, good for Bruce, Ben threw a TD pass to Weslye Saunders. YAY!

How are "passes to TE's" not part of the entire argument of this thread?! Even more than passer rating, it's TomlinEra's biggest argument for why Arians sucked and Haley is a genius. He included his expletive-filled, exclamation point riddled comment that HEATH HAS 4 td's!! Everyone who hated Arians points out how dumb he was for not using the tight end in the red zone. I point out the tight end was used quite often in the three games YOU provided and you suggest it's not "part of the argument?" Huh?

Why do I include rushing yards? Because everyone thinks Rooney was a genius for having Arians removed. Well, in his own words, he said a change needed to be made in the offensive philosophy and we needed to get back to running the ball. We're 1-2 now and we're throwing the ball 15 times more a game than we're running it. If you can't understand why that is an important argument, I feel sorry for you. How many 10pt 4th-quarter leads did Cowher lose in his fifteen years as head coach? Why? You know the answer. We RAN THE BALL. We ran the clock out. You know what we did with a 10pt fourth quarter lead at Oakland? Passed nearly twice as much as we ran it.

I'll take the 7+ more pts per game.

And I'll take 5 less turnovers in the red zone in the three 2011 games. How many times have the 2012 Steelers turned the ball over in the red zone? ZERO. Would you agree that has more to do with playcalling or player execution? Don't even bother answering that. It was a rhetorical question. You know the answer. Your little scoring numbers would have been skewed a bit had Antonio Brown not recovered his own fumble in the end zone on Sunday, wouldn't they? (another rhetorical question, don't bother) How about losing five of those scoring opportunities in the red zone? The stats you provided illustrate nothing. Grapes to watermelons.

But again: this is a ridiculously low sample and we can't draw many conclusions from it. You are using the eyeball test. Well, I have that too: how about open receivers to throw to? How about a WIDE OPEN Miller in the end zone in that Jets game, a terrificly, well-designed play, the likes of which we NEVER saw from Arians.

What's the difference between blown coverage and a "well-designed play?" Just curious . . . But, you're right. This is all silly and moot and just an exercise in futility after only three games. To say we can't draw many conclusions from it . . . I'm not sure about that yet. The stat that DOES stick out to me is the imbalance in the pass:run ratio. That isn't about performance or execution. That's about philosophy, scheme, and approach. And it's 180 degrees away from what Haley was brought in here to do (per Rooney's 'running' request).

We NEVER (all caps?) saw a well-designed play from Arians? Ha. Now you're just exagerrating. I thought the end around to Wallace from the one-yard line from behind our banged up line in the Denver playoff game last year was a hell of a call and a WELL-DESIGNED PLAY. I'm not going to scramble my brains to come up with more. That one jumped out at me before I could even finish reading your sentence.

As for 3-0 vs 1-2...the defense gave up 19 total points in those Arians' wins. That sorta helps, doesn't it? And don't give Arians' O credit for Brown's punt return TD against Cincy.

Where did I give any credit for Brown's punt return TD? Don't put words in my mouth.

Does our defense only giving up 19 total points help our W/L record? Of course. Does the fact that we turned the ball over inside our opponents 15-yard line 5 times make it more difficult for weak qb's like Tyler Thigpen, Andy Dalton, and Colt McCoy to take their teams 85+ yrds on scoring drives against us to help account for those anemic scoring numbers?

 

How are "passes to TE's" not part of the entire argument of this thread?! Even more than passer rating, it's TomlinEra's biggest argument for why Arians sucked and Haley is a genius.

But it wasn't MY argument.

Why do I include rushing yards? Because everyone thinks Rooney was a genius for having Arians removed. Well, in his own words, he said a change needed to be made in the offensive philosophy and we needed to get back to running the ball.

But this wasn't my argument either. I am not particularly concerned about yards on the ground. I don't know if Mendenhall will make a difference: maybe he can. I doubt it. The line is simply atrocious.

How many 10pt 4th-quarter leads did Cowher lose in his fifteen years as head coach? Why? You know the answer. We RAN THE BALL. We ran the clock out.

I get your point about "running out the clock, but no doubt, the way that defense was playing, the offense had to put up more points. The offense was not going to be able to sit on that lead, and all hell would have broken loose if the Steelers had simply ran the ball to no avail and had to repeatedly kick the ball away.

And I'll take 5 less turnovers in the red zone in the three 2011 games. How many times have the 2012 Steelers turned the ball over in the red zone? ZERO. Would you agree that has more to do with playcalling or player execution?

Turnovers are usually on the player. You're right. But turnovers were still no excuse for putting up just 13 points on KC.

We NEVER (all caps?) saw a well-designed play from Arians? Ha. Now you're just exagerrating. I thought the end around to Wallace from the one-yard line from behind our banged up line in the Denver playoff game last year was a hell of a call and a WELL-DESIGNED PLAY. I'm not going to scramble my brains to come up with more. That one jumped out at me before I could even finish reading your sentence.

I should have been specific: I meant pass play, inside the ten,which was why I referenced the Miller catch. I'll give you another, though, to aid Arians' creative playcalling: the two-point conversion in SB XLIV.

 

I don't want to jump in and ruin your argument, but the reality is....it is 3 games. It is almost impossible to look at stats at this point and say this is what this offense is capable of. What you see is BA's stats....IS what it was capable of. We don't really know what Haley's offense is capable of at this moment. There appear to be some areas that we have taken steps back (running game) and other areas we seem to have improved (scoring and TOP).

I would LOVE to just give this offense say...5 more games before we make any judgement about what this offense can do.

 

This is great discussion guys but the only stat that means sh** to me is wins and losses and right now at 1 and 2 that tells me Tomlin, both coordinators and the players all aren't doing what it takes to win

 

I am with you FeeltheSteel. Stats don't lie, people do.

I can't believe how quickly the board has turned on Dick Lebeau this season. That wouldn't have happened if we still had Arians. We haven't had Clark, Polomalu and Harrison on the field at the same time yet.

I have to admit I like visiting this board after a loss better than after a win. Win or lose, I still have to go to work, fix the house, cut the grass, pick up the dog's poop, pay the kid's tuition, etc. Win is a few hours of fun and days of boasting, lose and at least a few days of high emotion at thesteelersfans.com, it is great to be a Steelers fan.

 

You make some good and valid points but it was far too long lol

Bman

 

Uh, some people just can't let go and move on.

Let's see, our #1 RB is out, our #2 was injury prone in preseason to start the season, our expected starting right guard got injured, oh yeah, we've got offensive tackle issues. No kidding our running game is struggling after 3 games.

You can't evaluate a guys performance based solely on stats. Time of possession and scoring are two big ones, unfortunately with 2 defensive stars down, our defense has been the one struggling, not nearly as much as the offense. Feelthesteel is a clueless stats jockey and obviously looking for a fight.

Look at Ben's stats through 3 games again, 8 TD's 1 INT. Best he did under Arians 17-5 (2010) or 26-12 (2009) for a season, 2011 it was 21-14 or 3 TD's followed by 2 INT's. I'll take 8 to 1 every day of the week.

Understand that there are more dynamics going on here than just a change in OC. I've been pleasantly surprised that we have been able to sustain so many long drives so far this season. If we could just get our defense healthy and gelling, we should be in good shape.

 

This is the funniest thing I have read in here in a long time:

"You can't evaluate a guys peformance based solely on stats . . . "

the very next paragraph:

"Look at Ben's stats through 3 games again, 8 TD's 1 INT. Best he did under Arians 17-5 (2010) or 26-12 (2009) for a season, 2011 it was 21-14 or 3 TD's followed by 2 INT's. I'll take 8 to 1 every day of the week."

Awesome. Thanks for the laugh.

 

I love the dudes that get so flustered over somebody having a different opinion that they go on personal attacks.

I've been called a piece of shlt for not automatically agreeing with the idea that synthetic turf was THE reason for DeCastro's knee injury (choosing the idea that a 330lb man rolling on his lower leg having more to do with the injury) and now I get my own avatar making fun of me. What time is recess over?

All I'm doing is sharing my opinion. Thought that's what this forum was for. Steelers Talk? No? Maybe we should change it to Steelers Talk as Long as We All Share the Same Opinion on Everything? That would make for an exciting discussion.

 

How can you jump in and ruin my argument when your entire point (you can't evaluate the body of work after only 3 games) is a point I've already, myself, made on here about three times?

You're right. Even though we'll be a quarter of the way through the season after the Philly game (which is the first time that progress reports should come out), we won't have a better read until the midway point.

That's the whole purpose of the stats though. To display the thesis of this thread that we "fired Arians too late." As if to suggest our current mediocrity is to be blamed solely on our predecessor with no accountability for the new regime. Sounds like the president.

 

I never went back and read that thread. I was out of town for a week after that. I called him out because another guy tried to call him out and then laid off. And then he tried to be polite and tongue-in-cheek and include smileys and tried to be nice and HugeSnack still attacked him. Only then did I jump in and suggested the guy should speak his mind. And I came with "a barrage of insults" because he called me a piece of shlt the week before because I disagreed with him about some other obscure topic.

I might have made myself look a giant ass to some of the cronies that pump each other up, but I also received personal messages thanking me for 'going there.' People were sick of him consistently beating them down and were glad I spoke up. They just don't want to deal with the fallout of confonting him, I guess. Whatever. Somebody needed to say it. If some little clique wants to label me an ass, so be it.

I'm a liar and a phony? About what? Sounds like more poor analysis from you.

 

Haha. I don't travel on private jets. That's beyond my means.

If I posted pics of my tickets to Bernie Kosar's private box on opening day, pics with Bernie, and pics of my tickets to Heinz for the Jets game, would that make you drop this personal nonsense and get back to talking about the Steelers? Not sure what you think I'm "lying" about.

 

Sorry. I don't usually just lay down when someone calls me a "piece of shlt." But, if you read the thread where he did, you'd see that I was actually surprised to see him go there and I let it go.

I'm 6'5, 250 (sorry, more lies -- I'm 5'3", 75lbs). I'm used to ignoring the little man syndrome of small drunk dudes wanting to take shots at me in bars and whatnot. I always avoid them. There's nothing for me to gain. But if someone is starting a fight with a friend of mine, I jump in and take the fight on for my friend. Just habit, I guess.

I felt bad for the guy who was disagreeing with HugeSnack, was being condescended, politely disagreed again with smileys, again was condescended, and then drummed up the start of a personal attack and then quickly backtracked. It bothered me the guy was taking a stand against a guy who was bullying him so that's when I stepped in (being the victim of a "piece of shlt" comment from the same guy). Yeah, being a big guy (another lie -- I'm really a dwarf), I'm used to taking on that position of helping out someone who is being bullied (not that the guy I went to bat for needed any assistance).

And, if you (being the moderator/administrator/whatever), have access to be able to view my personal messages, you'll see I'm not the only one who felt that way. I was congratulated and thanked for going after him.