The BIG BIG ELEPHANT IN THE ROOM!!!!!

And I think your unwillingness to take off the rose-colored glasses is unwarranted.

Joe Burnett was on the roster. And the reason all of these players are on "my list" is because the Pittsburgh Steelers organization obviously saw some merit in them to draft them and turn them over to a position coach that is expected to make serviceable NFL players out of them.

 

weren't Burnett and Lewis friends in high school and I seem to remember Tomlin being excited about drafting them because he liked the story, friends who drive each other to be better and so on. Mac if we are going to be critical of position coaches because of lack of production there is going to be a lot of mud slung around here. Butler just got a huge promotion and he has had a less than stellar three year run leading up to this off season including having a guy who had retired providing the most pressure on the team and lets not mention Coach Mitchell's so so DE's before Cam Heyward started coming on.

 

keisel was playing well still. Timmons played well. foote played well. spence and Williams played well. moats did alright. Harrison has played very well and just got old. mclendon. woods. tuitt did alright for a rookie. ziggy wasn't near as bad as most labled him. jj played better last year but got hurt and shazier started off pretty good. Woodley played well before the turn for the worst injuries. I'm not sure either the line nor the LB'ers have really played terrible, just maybe during the transition period. it's not like we had a bunch of draft picks at those positions that just got cut loose before the season started.

 

though I will add thorn, he should have a ton of help from MT and should have had from DL while here.

 

Sorry Mac I meant to say Jack in that response However you illustrated my point we could cherry pick the roster for the last 20 years and see guys who never developed and blaming position coaches is an up and down prospect at best. I mean look at the guys who never made it at LB during Butler's tenure and yet no one is saying hey we expected him to do a better job at coaching up these guys. or are we saying that?

 

I've been known to comment about butler as well.

 

Quit sucking up to the coaches, BF. If Lake can't turn a bunch of 5th and 7th rounders who were drafted by a GM with a long history of struggling to evaluate CB talent into starters, why even have him around?? But seriously...

Points for Jack:

-Lake supposedly lobbied to draft some guys that didn't work out at all (5th rounders). Speaks to Lake's talent evaluation talent.

-Cortez Allen had some kind of meltdown last year. Lake is his position coach, and couldn't fix it (so far).

-As of last year, Shamarko Thomas had yet to claim the SS spot from Polamalu, or the backup spot from Will Allen, seemingly taking a step backwards.

-Mike Mitchell looked pretty damn bad at times last year. You could say he sucked all year.

Points for BF:

-Colbert drafts the players. He takes advice, but has total authority. And Tomlin has a louder whisper in his ear than Lake. How many of the guys that didn't pan out with us had success elsewhere? None, because they simply weren't good enough. No, Lake couldn't save Curtis Brown. But Curtis Brown turned out to be non-NFL material that just couldn't cut it in coverage. Ditto Richardson, Hawthorne, Frederick, Burnett... Colbert has a poor record with CBs, largely because he only takes them in mid-late rounds, so success rate is low to begin with. Are we really asking our DB coach to make good players out of guys that don't belong in the league? I think all we can ask is that he gets the most out of our guys. For some guys, the most is nothing.

-Who in the hell knows how possible it would have been to help Cortez last year? He was obviously going through some kind of weird crisis. There's no telling what role Lake could have played.

-Shamarko's lack of playing time can only be attributed to things off the game field. Maybe he sucked in practice. But maybe there are other factors, like Tomlin's trust in veterans over youngsters (especially his boy Will Allen), Shamarko's injury and lack of practice time, and those two things combined. Tomlin said this himself, if you want to believe him. Additionally, Shamarko looked promising the little we have seen of him, holding up okay as a rookie SS playing CB, and as a special teamer. Additionally, how much you wanna bet he won't start week 1 of 2015? He just lost a bit of competition. You can say he is still behind Will Allen on the depth chart. I say LaMarr Woodley was behind Clark Haggans on the depth chart. Last year they felt like an ill-prepared Shamarko was a roll of the dice compared to steady Will. This year the "competition" will be something like Lawrence Timmons vs. incumbent Larry Foote - who was so certain of the outcome that he asked to change teams. Shamarko is the starter, and will have to prove he's a failure before they take it away. We'll have to wait and see, but I'm betting he is good by the end of this year.

-Mike Mitchell is the FA equivalent of a boom/bust draft pick. He had 4 crappy years and 1 good year with a lot of help, and we signed him to a big contract. We were all hoping he'd pull a Ryan Clark, but there were a lot of signs he wouldn't work out. It's worth noting he still might work out and it's too early to say either Lake or Mitchell have failed. I think he improved toward the end of the season. LeBeau's scheme is famously complicated, and players are rarely thrown into it like Mitchell was.

-Under Lake, a number of players have outperformed expectations in the eyes of many. For my eyes, those players include Brice McCain and Antwon Blake, both of whom played much better for us than they did for their previous teams, Cortez Allen up until last year, and William Gay, who, since Lake's arrival, went from hapless scrub to decent backup to decent starter that scores touchdowns. It's worth noting Gay's turnaround began in his 5th year, 2-3 years later than the light bulb typically turns on for CBs. I absolutely give Lake credit for that. In fact, I don't even know what else to attribute it to. Gay's progress has also increased steadily since then, not common for a CB in his 6th, 7th, 8th year.

-Keenan Lewis is almost the definition of a talented player stinkin' it up too much to be on the field. He needed coaching. Satisfied with those results? He became great for us. Way better than I thought he'd ever be.


To me, Jack's view of Lake's failures is really just failure to work miracles. Hell, I'd even consider the turnaround of William Gay to be a miracle. So now we're saying he can't work all the miracles. Being satisfied with that isn't rose-colored to me. But if there's such a thing as poo-colored glasses...

 

That's great.

 

just wow.

 

Impressed, huh?

 

LOL I don't even know where to begin snack. it will be a whole big thing I'm not even sure I want to get into. so yep, I'm depressed.

 

LOL. give me time.

 

I think you're thinking about the friendship between Lewis and Mike Wallace dating back to high school

Excuse the crap out of me, Blast, for WANTING AT LEAST ONE FREAKING DEFENSIVE BACK THAT WE'VE DRAFTED IN THE LAST HALF DECADE TO AT LEAST MAKE SOME MEANINGFUL CONTRIBUTION TO THE TEAM UNDER LAKE'S TUTELAGE!!!!!

I'm not expecting Lake to make Woodsons and Blounts out of the guys he's had to work with, but I'd like to see some development out of some of these young guys. Where have we finished in pass defense the last couple of seasons? Check it out. It ain't pretty! Does any of the blame for that fall on the shoulders of the secondary coach? I think it does!

It amazes me at how some of you rose colored glasses wearing Pollyannas (looking at you, Blast ) go crazy when someone dares criticize the results of one of your pet coaches by putting up arguments like "Lake can't work miracles", blah, blah, blah, blah, blah! I'm not expecting miracles, I'd just like ONE SERVICEABLE GUY OF THE LAST 7 THAT WE'VE DRAFTED!

And, Snack, you've got waaaay too much time on your hands.

 

And you're obviously missing mine. I don't expect Lake to work miracles and I don't even necessarily think he's a bad coach. But, with a couple of exceptions, I'm not happy with the results we've gotten out of the DBs we've drafted and signed via free agency over the last few seasons. Is ALL of that on Lake? No. Is some of that, maybe a good portion of that on Lake? I think so. He's the DB coach. Correct me if I'm wrong, but does the DB coach job description say something about getting positive results out of the personnel he's given to coach? It's a results oriented league. If you don't get results, you deserve some criticism. That seems like a foreign concept to some.

 

The really good coaches seem to be able to get the most out of mediocre talent. If you'll notice above, I did say that there were a couple of exceptions and McCain and Blake were who I had in mind. We haven't gotten much of anything really out of the DBs that we've drafted, however. That doesn't sit well with me. And there you go with your excuses again; those guys were "4th round or later". So what! A couple of them were third rounders. You know what, if you want to be considered a really good coach in the National Football League then get something out of your 3rd, 4th and 5th round draft picks! And you must be saying that I wear rose colored glasses because I do back the team. I'm just not reluctant to criticize a coach or player when it's warranted.

 

No Jack i am almost positive it was Lewis and Burnett being life long friends and how cool it was that they were both drafted by the Steelers even though Burnett was a project guy. I am going to have to do some digging.

 

Oh, okay, I either wasn't aware or had forgotten about that. I know Lewis and Wallace were high school friends though.