Let the games begin

Oh, now you must be kidding me. The scene is on Sunday, the last one before the season, and I am out enjoying a nice afternoon with some friends. I call another friend of mine, a big Steelers fan, and she says she heard that Ben had an appendectomy and would be out for the start of the season. Now, I took it with a grain of salt, since I was nowhere near any information source. She was in the same position, so she was unsure herself of the validity of the story. We opined that perhaps some football fan friends of ours, fans of other teams of course, were trying to get under our skin in a friendly, yet macabre, way. It was many hours before I would get home and be able to check out the facts. When I finally did, I spent the first part of my investigation time reading slack jawed about the death of Steve Irwin.

When I finally exhausted any fresh news, I confirmed that Roethlisberger did have an emergency appendectomy and would miss the season opener and perhaps even the second and third games of the season. After all that happened to him this summer, and wondering if he may even play again after his horrific motorcycle accident, this was just the icing on the cake. Getting excited that he was fully recovered from the accident and would indeed play, and to then have this awful thing happen is like having the rug pulled out from under my feet. I know I am not the only fan that feels this way, and I would be willing to bet that Ben himself is feeling this too. Now, we go into the first game against a hungry Dolphins team with Charlie Batch starting and Hines Ward not one hundred percent.

Since the Super Bowl win, it has been a crazy off season. Wait, what am I talking about. Since those last seconds ticked off, I have not had an off season. For me, the season has never ended. I have devoured every item I could about the Steelers and football that I could find. I could not understand why no one was talking NFL in March, it seemed foreign to me. With the season now merely hours away, it seems to me not like the season has finally started, but that everyone finally woke up and realized they took too long of a break. But before we go any further, let’s have a quick recap of the craziness that was the extra long break, shall we?

Kimo von Olhoffen, Antwaan Randle El and Chris Hope are shown the money by other teams and depart.

Offensive coordinator Ken Whisenhunt gives everyone a slight coronary by flirting with taking the Oakland coaching job. After getting a look at the mess there, he realizes how good he has it and stays in Pittsburgh.

Jerome Bettis retires, gets hired by NBC, then causes a mini drama with Bill Cowher during a broadcast in the preseason where he mentions he feels this is Cowher’s last season. Cowher does not care for his public assessment of the situation.

Cowher does not sign a new contract, as he always has in the past with two years left on his current contract, with a cloud of suspicion on whether this is a money issue or a family issue. He did move his wife and youngest daughter to a newly purchased home in North Carolina, further fueling suspicions and unfounded rumors.

They draft uber-hyped receiver Santonio Holmes who manages to get arrested twice for two different charges in two different states before training camp starts.

Tommy Maddox completes his bitter fallout with the team, is released, and refuses to attend the ring ceremony.

The rumors of Joey Porter’s potential holdout due to his unhappiness with his contract. – Mercifully, this never came to be. Cowher diffused this one pretty quickly.

Hines Ward becomes an international sensation and begins to do work on helping mixed race children in South Korea. – Ok, this was not much drama, but I thought I’d mix it up with a nice bright spot. Until…

Hines has a long interview in Sports Illustrated, where he drops the smile and talks about how he has felt in the past that the team has never recognized him as the #1 guy, and keeps drafting receivers instead of showing him the love. He did get shown the money last year, though. He also mentions how he is not all that close to Cowher. Great potential locker room divide. – So far, seems to have just been blown over. Hines, if it makes you feel any better, you’ve always been the #1 to me.

Joey Porter creates a mini controversy before the Steelers go to the White House, saying he’s got a few things to say to the president. – This one I have no idea why it was a big deal. Joey has a few things to say to everybody! Why was anyone shocked at this?

Of course, Roethlisberger nearly spilling his brains all over the pavement in Pittsburgh. Miraculously, he manages to heal almost as fast as Wolverine, somehow raising his Pittsburgh legend even more. – He keeps this up, he’ll be in Lemieux territory soon.

The team manages to put up a big goose egg in wins during the preseason. – yeah not that the preseason means squat, but it would be nice to win at least one of them.

Hines seems to have the unhealable hamstring, which kept him out of every preseason game. Although he said he will play in the opener.

And of course, right before the start of the season, Ben has an appendectomy.

Gee, I hope I did not miss anything. Despite all of this, or maybe because of it, I am itching for the season to start. I just want to get back to some hard hitting, hard charging football and watch my team defend their title. All preseason I keep hearing about how the Steelers were lucky, how they will not repeat. How they will not even win their division. How they lost too many leaders. How everyone else is so much better. The talking head prognosticators have driven me nuts with these stupid predictions. I am trying to figure out how they cannot repeat. They did not lose that much in the off season. No personnel losses that cannot be overcome. Yes, Jerome was a great leader and a locker room presence, but they have a few others in there too. If you doubt that, I would love for you to have a quick chat with Mr. Joey Porter. And they have their entire core still in place. And yes, they did get lucky last year. But luck must always be there. Everything came together at the right time and it clicked.

Plus, they have one big factor, motivation. Ben is motivated to show he is better than his display in the Super Bowl. The team is motivated to show they can win without those who have left. They are motivated to show their Super Bowl victory was not a fluke. They are motivated to show they can win back to back championships like the great Steelers teams of the 70s, which they are still working to get out from under the shadow of those impressive teams. They are motivated to show that everything that happened in the off season is not a distraction, but fuel for the fire.

And each and every talking head keeps giving them more motivation with each prediction. Many are saying Cincinnati will run away with the division. But these people seem to be forgetting that the Bengal’s schedule last year was a cupcake one. This year, it will not be, and their defense is not markedly improved. Plus, by the time the season is even four games in, half the team may be behind bars with the way they have behaved in the off season. It looks like they imported a bunch of criminals to Cincinnati. You have a great team to be proud of over there, Bengals fans. Pittsburgh will be rocking the same defense, and their schedule last year was as difficult as the one they have this year. Plus, well minus the Santonio Holmes issues, our boys keep their noses clean. They will always be the Bungles to me, and the Bungles suck.

Many are saying the Colts will strangle the competition. Well, they stepped down in the running back department and last time I checked, when it came to the post season, they did not know how to strangle, but were pretty good at choking. And then I hear they cannot even admit we beat them, when their offensive line coach says that Pittsburgh did not beat them, they beat themselves. I watched the game, and it looked like Pittsburgh beat you. And then Manning calls his offensive line out after the game? Look, they may have had a bad game, but considering how much crap they keep off your back, and how much you may be right in your assessment Peyton, you do not call them out to the media. Pittsburgh can handle the pressure of the post season. Only a team that won four road playoff games can really say they can handle the pressure. The Colts suck.

Many are saying that New England is once again the team to beat. How so? They lost yet another coordinator, lost more talent again, did not bring in hardly any proven talent, got rid of a defensive leader and their Super Bowl winning kicker (yes, he may not be worth the money he wanted, but that is just bad karma when you jettison the guy who won you two rings with his foot), are in a protracted contract dispute with their number one receiver and did little to fix their constant problem spots. I know many will say that the Patriots have always overcome these things, but they did not last year. Last year, it caught up with them big time. Who says it will not again? Pittsburgh has no disputes with anyone on their roster, has their core in place, all their coaches intact and generally is bringing out the same team and staff as last year. The same Super Bowl winning team and staff. New England sucks.

Many are saying the Ravens will explode this year. How so? Their defense is a year older, and that much more ineffective (the glory days of 2000 are over, ask the 1985 Bears how fast it goes away). And on a quick side note, I am sick and tired of hearing about how the 2000 Ravens had the greatest defense of all time. Oh, they put up some terrific numbers, but they were in no way the greatest of all time. They did that for one year. One. They won one Super Bowl. One. I will not detract from their accomplishment, but it should not rank them as the greatest. The greatest should be ranked by sustained excellence. You can always capture lightning in a bottle, but to do it consistently? Look at the 70’s Steelers for that. 4 Super Bowl wins in 6 years. Sustained excellence. Also, they got rid of the one running back who was making a difference last year, killed the confidence of their young quarterback who was briefly showing signs of life late last season by bringing in a veteran with a penchant for breaking down more often than an a Yugo. I would normally make a comment on our quarterback’s durability, but lately that seems to be a slight point of contention, so I will just say the Ravens suck and move on.

I have been waiting for this for as long as I can remember. I have said it before, and I’ll say it again, I am a huge Steelers fan. And watching them win the Super Bowl was like a dream come true. And I know that many of the talking heads have to make guesses and predictions, which is what they get paid to do. But for the past few years all I have heard is many of these people worshipping at the feet of Brady and Patriots, extolling from the highest mountain tops the virtues of the Colts and Manning, The constant crowing of how great Steve Smith and the Panthers are, who for the second year in a row are the preseason Super Bowl winner pick of Sports Illustrated. Seriously, who is paying them for that? They make one Super Bowl appearance, and now they are perennial favorites? Go figure. But now, Pittsburgh is the winner, the top dog, the number one team, but if you listen to enough of these jokers, you would not know it. Many of them are saying Pittsburgh will not even make the playoffs. And I ask, why not? They are used to playing a tough schedule, used to playing tough games and tough opponents. They are accustomed to adversity and hardship and now know the path to becoming a champion. I believe that now that they have tasted it, they will want to walk the path often. I believe they have just as much of a chance as anyone, and maybe more, because they are the defending champions.

I am not bitter, nor a sore winner. I would just like to see Pittsburgh get their proper due. How about some recognition for how much they had to go through to get that trophy. No other team has ever won 4 playoff games on the road, ever. Plus they were against the top 3 seeds in the AFC and the top seed in the NFC. But it seems as though everyone believes it was nothing more than luck. I think maybe a few other factors may have played into their winning streak and championship. It seems to me that part of why everyone is discounting Pittsburgh already is because they are not a sexy pick. They are a bruising team with a stout defense and an offense dominated by a running game where the main axiom is three yards and a cloud of dust. But that is one of the reasons I like them so much. They are a blue collar team, exemplified by players that are a true team and will do whatever it takes to make each other better and win. Look at Hines Ward, he smiles on every play, whether he is scoring a touchdown untouched or popping a defensive back in the mouth to lay a block for someone else. That is the type of team they are and why I love them. I watched an interview with Chuck Noll, Bill Cowher’s predecessor and the only coach to win 4 Super Bowls. And he said his motto was whatever it takes. And by that he meant that whatever it took to win, if someone was not able to do something, everyone else had to step up and do more. And when you did what you had to do, try to do more to add to the team. Playing as a team, working hard, doing what it takes to succeed. From success in the past to success now and in the future, this is the core of the team. Now how can you not root for a team like that?

But they are just not sexy enough for everyone. They do not have the slick high powered offense of the Colts. The out of nowhere model quarterback of Tom Brady. The history of the Green Bay Packers. The slick perfection and dominance of the 49’s in the 80’s. The gravities of being America’s Team like the Cowboys. They are just a blue collar team from a blue collar town with the best and largest groups of fans in the world. It truly is Steelers Nation. They are everywhere. I see them everyday, and I live 2000 miles from Pittsburgh. That is what is hard for me to understand. You have a team that is loved everywhere, yet even after winning it all; they still seem to be brushed aside. I know one win does not make them dominant; people did not start crowing about the Patriots until after their second win, but look at how much of an impact Pittsburgh and its fans have had. The DVD highlights of the post season were the best selling of all time. The Super Bowl was one of the highest rated in years. In the last year, 40% of all merchandise sold was Pittsburgh related. The team has a few fans, and I think the more they keep hearing about their team falling flat this year, the more frenzied they will become, and the more that will feed into the team, and the more motivated they will become.

I am hoping the team is feeling what I am now; even more determined to prove everyone wrong. If there was a way I could do something to make that happen myself, I would. At the moment, all I can do is wave my towel and cheer my lungs out. I hope they want to show everyone they should not doubt and recognize a great team, great fans, a great city and a great organization. I know as the season looms, things are up in the air with Ben and Hines. But I know the team will go out and give it their all. After all, things looked pretty gloomy right before the Chicago game last year too, and that turned out pretty well. And like some fair weather fans I have heard lately, I’m talking about you Dave Dameshek, I will not be picking Miami to win in the opener. I will be making the same pick I have made every week, and will continue to make every week, no matter what the odds are or how poorly the team may be playing. I am picking Pittsburgh to win. Let the season begin!

Now they better not lose and make me look stupid, I can do that on my own.