Former Steelers Players doing well

What do all these guys have in common -
Kevin Dotson, Kendrick Greene, Steven Nelson, Arthur Maulet and Ahkello Witherspoon?

They all are former Steelers who are playing really well for their current teams. In some cases like Dotson he us the second highest rated guard by PFF so far this season.

Good quality players who have come from other teams to Pittsburgh are not doing so well. Seamalu, Peterson and Wallace. It was obvious Peterson was a risk and not a system fit but how is it Seamalu is just an average guy compared to his play in Philadelphia. Sure he was surrounded by better talent.

I just feel like there is a massive void between the front office and the coaches. Are we not getting players that are good fits for the system? I believe for some reason our coaches are so married to the system they are going to force it on players wether it us a fit or not. I don’t understand it.

I remover when players would come here and be their best like Farrior or they would leave here and never be as good as they were here like Chad Brown. It is very difficult to evaluate the play of any of these players with the coaching being so bad.

Let’s hope Rooney steps in and forces change . I understand Tomlin is an esteemed coach in this league but sometimes these guys like Belicheck gain to much power and it effects there ability to adequately coach the team and keep the team relevant. It is so obvious this team is blatantly inept if coaching talent and that we have a flawed scheme on both sides of the ball. Tomlin has to take a lesser role and just be the HC or they need to get rid of him as well. His arrogance and for whatever reason his inability to get top level coordinators in board has to change. Hopefully Rooney sees what everyone else does and has the courage to change it.

 

I don't think that Rooney will make major change in the offseason.I mean he keep Canada after 2 awful years on offense.It will take more of this for Rooney to wake up

 

Here is a related whine

http://thesteelersfans.com/forums/threads/steelers-system-sucks.31511/

 

You could speculate the disconnect is from getting rid of players too soon and of course, they are not coached very well.

 

Isn't Green out for the season now? Don't get me wrong he definitely balled out vs his old team with a chip on his shoulder but let's face it Steelers coaching staff is currently a rotating dumpster fire when it comes to coaching guys up.

 

I'd also add for each and every one of those players listed there are the Matt Filier's, Devin Bush, Benny Snell, AV, Jesse James, Baron Batch, Fitzgerald Toussaint, Zach Gentry, insert player name here, situations that also proves players let go not doing well.

 

Which may indicate that our talent evaluation may be just fine but our coaches fail to coach them up to the next level once they get here.

 

Related whine? I’m not sure it is whining when one is producing facts to back up truth. I don’t know about you but we here the same thing every offseason we need to get better in the trenches. We need to get the running game going. Nothing ever changes. Then when in season and we don’t play up to the hype the message is always the same “ The players need to execute better and we need to coach better”. It is always the same but we never enforce real change and nobody is ever held accountable. It just gets old. But hey 9-8 here we come. There has to be reason why we can not get good coordinators here. To quality coaches not like coaching under Tomlin? Does Tomlin not like tenured Coordinators because he perceives them as a threat and he wants all of the control? Something just isn’t making sense.

This team has high pedigree players everywhere. We have the talent... even on the offensive line now. This is all about coaching now. To me when the message is about player execution I feel that is a cop out. I understand maybe player execution for a few games but when it is year after year then either the scheme is not being coached right, the scheme is too difficult and what we are asking players to do within the scheme is too much or the scheme does not fit our personnel. Anyway you look at it the finger points back to the coaching in my mind. When you keep on trying to do the same thing over and over and over and nothing changes and you continual blame the players it wreaks of arrogance on the coaches part.

 

So this is the first season in which this was the case in a long long time. How has Chase Claypool done? Artie Burns? I hear Devin Bush is trade bait for the Seahawks.

Dodson was a good player here. So was Maulet. Cap casualties ultimately. Many acknowledged that. If Greene is holding his own good, he sucked here. I don't think many were weeping with that trade.

 

I've speculated that there are or were signs of schism in the coaching when you looked at some of the confusion when Porter was the OLB coach and Butler was still DC where it looked like Porter was doing things the way he wanted and not the way Butler did. My thought was that Porter and Tomlin had a closer relationship than Butler and Tomlin and Kieth knew it and couldn't go to Tomlin and say that Porter was undercutting his authority and so he just let it happen until they both weren't brought back.

 

All those players you listed were fairly irrelevant on the Steelers as well. Bush’s demise started in Pittsburgh. Fieler might be the only one that was a starter here and his career regressed after leaving here. None of them were thriving here. In addition the players that I mentioned were all recent players that have left. So it is more of an indication of our recent woes as in last three years. Farrior and Chad Brown were probably bad examples because they were from a while ago.

 

Bingo that was kinda my whole point.

 

Sure would like to have seen Cam Sutton still in Black & Gold.

 

Burns is irrelevant he was from a while ago. The main point was the internees of this current coaching staff and getting the most out of our players. So you can choose Claypool and Bush as examples but I think we all realize there is more to it with those two than just coaching and talent. It was pretty obvious in both cases both those guys lack motivation on an individual basis for whatever reason to take their play to the next level. with that being said I am not certain they will do well regardless of who they are coached under. As a result I believe your examples are irrelevant for this argument.

 

The whole point of the argument is that you can pretty much point to this year for a couple players alone I could go back decades that showed ex Steelers pretty much doing nothing.

Also let's point to the additions of Elandon Robert's, Holcomb, Alexander who are a clear upgrade. They did not come here and immediately suck because they are now wearing a Steelers Uniform.

So let's fire Tomlin while we're at it because even with struggling on offense they sit at 3-2. Also how many trams have changed coaches mid season to turn it around and light it up?

 

I don’t like the way Tomlin handled the defense the last few years of Lebeau’s tenure or the way he kind of pushed Butler out. It feels like he has desired to have full control of the defense for a long time. The defense was much better when he was not in control of it. Now he is trying to play a hybrid 3-4 and 4-3 with a mixture of the Tampa 2 and it just doesn’t work. We have never been able to stop the run since Tomlin took over the defense. The defense has been completely sold out to sacking the QB and creating splash plays and turnovers. It just isn’t a sustainable formula on defense especially when you have an offense that can’t run the ball and support your defense or put the opposing team in catch up mode where they have to abandon the run and play into our strengths which is the pass rush.

The formula to beat us is to run the ball and play action pass. Everybody knows it and everybody does it. Rooney has got to step in and enforce change. I believe Tomlin still can be a viable head coach but his control over the team has to be whittled down and he has to be forced to get competent coordinators in place and he has to let them actually coach instead of micromanaging them. Can that all be done? I don’t know. But it is obvious there is no cohesion in both units. Our blocking scheme does not seem to support our offensive scheme and to me that is direct reflection of no direction and to many chiefs in the kitchen. The players seem confused with no identity. But yet it is the players fault because they aren’t executing.

I love how Tomlin stands up there after a loss and says we need to execute better and we need to coach better. We won’t seek comfort in this loss and we accept and we need to get back in the lab and address things. It is all hyperbole and smokescreen. He basically says all of that so the media won’t question him. Its his way of sort of accepting blame in a blanket way but then never really getting into the details of why we are failing and never being forced by the media to truly accept responsibility. It just gets old. Then we seem to have just enough games every year where a splash play or turnover wins it and we keep being teased. But when was the last time this team had a win where we just played solid football across the board and marched up and down the field and won by three touchdowns. Where are defense held the other team to less than 100 yards rushing and less than 200 yards passing. I know that is hard to do in todays NFL but man does every win have to be an ugly win? Those kind of wins don’t make for promising records and they certainly don’t serve your team well if you get in the playoffs against better competition.

Every good leader is held to a standard and is accountable to that standard. Is Rooney truly doing his job as the owner and holding Tomlin to that Standard or have we lowered our expectations as an organization now on what the Standard is?

 

This is the guy I thought of when I saw the thread title, but he left as a free agent rather than being cut loose or traded by the team. Yes, they should have made signing him an offseason priority. Every time Patrick Peterson gets torched, it is a reminder of their blunder.

 

There is no denying the players that have moved on this year are doing better another teams. That is a direct reflexing of our schemes and the coaching. What else could it be? It just isn’t one player and the fact we brought players in (in particular on the offensive line) who are struggling really is telling. I am not suggesting we fire anybody in season. But we need to make wholesale change this offseason. I like Tomlin as a head coach but only under the condition that he no longer coaches the defense. He needs to get a competent DC not a lackey that is a DC in name only and one that implements his own system and not some hybrid 3-4 / 4-3 system that only stresses putting pressure on the QB and splash plays. It just is not a sustainable way of playing defense. Tomlin defense puts a ton of pressure on the outside CB’s and MLB’s. So I am not surprise we have struggled to find players for this positions. With that being said we really should put a very high premium on finding the very best CB talent possible if were going to play his style of defense.

The bottom line is we need cohesion and competence and we have neither. I feel like for whatever reasons Tomlin does not like to give up control and he likes to micromanage. I only developed these thoughts based on how he handled Lebeau’s last few years and how he handled Butler at Defensive Coordinator. It was apparent he slowly took full control of the Defense. Could that be happening on offense as well to certain extent. It makes you wonder. I know on defense he has a mixture of the 3-4 and 4-3 with smallish gap penetrators on the defensive interior. So he has not truly committed to the 3-4 in fact he really runs more of a 2 down lineman with two standup edge players but his two down lineman are more built for 4-3 play where they gap penetrate so it is no wonder we give up big run plays. We aren’t committed to stopping the run. We never have been ever since Tomlin took over the defense.

None of this will get better until Rooney steps in and strips Tomlin of some of this power and forces him to get legitimate coordinators in place who implement bona fide schemes and systems instead of hybrid systems so we can truly match talent with scheme and players understand expectations and aren’t playing confused. I feel like the Coordinators have very little power under Tomlin and the team is operating inefficiently with everything waiting on why guy whom controls all the power. Thats just my observation. What I do know is this is defiantly a coaching issue and not a talent issue. All of these recent players leaving this year and having success can’t be coincidental. I could understand if it were one player or two but that many players. It says an awful lot.Lets hope it opens Rooneys eyes,

 

Greene played okay against the Steelers, but overall, he was only starting because the Texans were desperate up front and he is out for the season.

Maulet is a middling slot corner, no better than what the team has now. He made one good play against the Steelers, then got away with blatant pass interference in the end zone on another.

Witherspoon had stretches when he played well for the Steelers, too, then he went back to geting torched.

I would have liked to see them keep Nelson. He was a solid player in Pittsburgh, too.

Dotson was a decent player in Pittsburgh, too. The Steelers just thought they could upgrade. I wouldn't get too excited about anything from PFF. Those idiots still think Myles Garrett is better than T.J. watt.

You have a mix of players who were good in Pittsburgh, too, and those who aren't as good as you seem to think with their new teams.

The other side of your premise doesn't work, either. Peterson has turned out to be a bad fit because his skills have faded due to age. That's not coaching, except Tomlin's part in the team signing him.

Wallace wasn't anything special in Buffalo, either.

Seamalu is a weird one, but one player does not make a trend.

By the way, Chad Brown was selected to two Pro Bowls and one All-Pro team after leaving the Steelers.

I have issues with the coaching staff, too, but this doesn't hold up as well as you think.

 

There is plenty of room to deny your premise. Maulet is an okay slot guy, which is what he was as a Steeler. Green played one decent game against the Steelers, though he showed some of the same tendency to get shoved into his own backfield, then got knocked out for the season. Dotson was good as a Steeler. So was Nelson.

Many of these guys are journeymen. This is what they do. They are either middling players all the time or they have moments that they look great, then go back to mediocrity.

 

I didn’t point him out because he was god when he was with us. The other players were average overall as a whole.

 

Since you are obviously a Tomlin defender what is it that you suf=ggest their issues are? All these players going elsewhere and playing well is obviously just coincidental in your mind. I would be curious to here from you what their issues are on defense and offense, who is at fault and how do we fix them?

 

I wish we could have kept Arthur Maulet, he has a lot of heart ... you want guys like that on your roster.

 

Ill give you your point on Maulet and Witherspoon. Dotson had half a decent year his first year he played then seems to regress with us. Peterson should have never been signed. It was a desperate move after losing Sutton. Wallace was solid for Buffalo but never this bad. Seamalu is the one that is really telling for me. The offensive line coach has had half a season where the line has performed above average. We brought him in after he was let go by a middling team in Carolina. Why not go get somebody from SF or Philadelphia? Brown may have had a couple good seasons in Seattle but he wasn’t close to what he was in Pittsburgh. That was a bad example on my part anyway because it was from a long time ago.

 

If this is not a coaching issue,I don't know what it is