Christmas Ape of D.C. Steeler Nation Weighs in on Sunday Night's Battle

D.C. Steeler Nation and Kissing Suzy Kolber blogger/author/teller of dick jokes, Christmas Ape, kindly agreed to exchange scouting reports and insights with AJM.

The theme of the exchange was to provide optimism for the opposition---Steelers are 1-2---Chargers never win regular season games in the 'Burgh---optimism is in high demand for each side. For my bit of Bolt pessimism/Steeler optimism, click here. As for the Steeler perspective; let the good feelings commence......

As long as the Chargers are in it going into the 4th quarter, you'll have many a worried Stiller fan being shown during crowd shots at Heinz Field Sunday night.

Pittsburgh has somehow essentially reversed its M.O. from last year. Whereas then they didn't do anything offensively until they absolutely had to - and fortunately did - this year, they're storming hard out of the gate in every game and fizzling down the stretch. Which would be okay if they built up a commanding enough lead, but they've allowed teams to hang around enough that it's come back to bite them in the ass the past two weeks.

Willie Parker would probably be thrilled to see San Diego if he weren't nursing the latest in what has been a series of iffy injuries this season. The guy suddenly revealed that he'd been dealing with a tweaked hammy after doing nothing against the Titans in Week 1, which smacked of an excuse more than anything. The Bolts, after all, were the last team he went over 100 yards against, even if that was last January. So Rashard Mendenhall should probably get a majority of the touches, which isn't the worst thing for the Steelers, because he's actually looked pretty good when he hasn't run into Roethlisberger on hand-offs. He and Mewelde Moore can also actually catch passes out of the backfield and occasional block, so having them out there doesn't telegraph to the defense what they're hoping to do.

For as much criticism as the Steelers O-line gets, it's actually been halfway good in terms of pass blocking. It's when they try running the ball when everything falls apart. Then again, that was the case last year as well, and the team managed against San Diego in the two meetings. So I guess the Steelers have reason to be optimistic in that regard.

Where the Chargers can feel good: hey, remember Santonio Holmes? The guy who broke that punt return TD in the playoffs against you guys and generally had an amazing postseason? Well, he had a great game against the Titans and then suddenly reverted to the mental-lapse prone guy who irritated all the team's fans for a good share of last season. Last week, he didn't recognize a hot read, which resulted in a pick-six for the Bengals. The week before, he dropped four passes, including what would have been a game-winning touchdown. Thankfully, we won't even have to get into Limas Sweed, because he got buried beneath Shaun McDonald on the depth chart.

More good news! The Steelers pass rush has been mostly nonexistent. They haven't registered more than two sacks in any of their games in 2009. This is partly due to the fact that this season, teams are closely following a blueprint that calls for quick timing patterns to offset the pass rush. This won't get you many big plays, but will allow you to peel off some long sustained drives and wear down the Steelers defense late in the game, as the Bears and Bengals have the previous two weeks. Also, the this strategy doesn't lead to many turnovers, evidenced by the fact that the Steelers defense hasn't forced any since the two in the Titans game.

Also, the absence of Polamalu, as you might expect, has made a lot of Dick LeBeau's blitzing schemes very vanilla and easy to recognize. And a quarterback of Rivers caliber should be able to easily take advantage unless the Steelers try some more daring things this week. The Chargers have a definite size advantage with their tall receivers vis-a-vis a corner like William Gay, so I'd imagine Rivers will try to float a few jump balls, which wouldn't be the worst strategy in the world.

The Steelers special teams, other than Jeff Reed's recent transformation into Shaun Suisham, have been a bright spot. They actually have a returner capable of bringing the ball out past the 30. And their punting is much improved by dint of no longer having to call Mitch Berger onto the field on 4th down.

So honestly, I'm not sure what to expect. The past two games have been deflating losses, but they've been on the road to what you could describe as at least respectable teams (okay, Cincy might still be unproven this year, but they beat a solid Green Bay team). The fact that this is a definite must-win game at home gives me faith that the Steelers will lay it all out there, but the Chargers certainly have enough ability to steal another away.

For the contribution and insights, cheers, Ape.

Pick up a copy of Ape's book (aka Mike Tunison) : The Football Fan's Manifesto

I tried to pick it up at Borders back in August but it wasn't in stock so I settled on The Blind Side by Michael Lewis, about Ravens tackle Michael Oher. So what I'm saying is that I don't have it BUT IF YOU ALL buy enough copies maybe he'll send me one, gratis (although it's now highly unlikely with the revelation that I bought a book about a guy who plays for the Baltimore Ravens).

Week 3 Victory: Upon Further Digestion....

Upon further digestion, I've de-deuced that I'm just a giant crybaby. A WIN......IS A WIN! If I continue to watch the Chargers each week and then gripe over how they win games then I'll be as miserable as a Lion fan c. 2008 (or would it be c. 1929-2009?). Are there things I'd like to see the Chargers do better? Sure.

Like anyone else, I'd love to see red zone efficiency. I don't blame the players so much for the inefficiencies but instead look at the FG attempts as a function of the play calling. We often hear how inside the twenty yard line the field becomes shorter and consequently a more difficult area to score. Well I have news for Norv....when you choose to run a 5 foot nothing, 100 pound nothing in to the line on every 1st down, that Red Zone GETS EVEN SMALLER!!!!! Utilize our receivers height. On first down throw a jump ball to one of the giants and get the touchdown via an alley-oop. Jump Ball. Seriously. Run the picket fence at 'em.

The play calling is really my only complaint. We have tons of injuries and guys are stepping up to the challenge. We can't control the injuries and it'll probably be after the bye week before we see LT and Merriman. But we can control the inventiveness and the overall strategy with which we attack. We can control the health of Phillip by having him take shorter drops and hitting the big fellas with shorter passes. Fifty yard bombs are fun but so are underneath routes that allow receivers to accumulate YAC. Those sorts of plays also control the clock because of their high completion percentage. Of course, what the hell do I know?

2-1 and traveling to Steel Town makes me happier than 1-2. Troy Polamalu's absence shows just how important he is to that Steeler defense and so that gives me hope that we can sneak into the bye week above .500.

One last thing.....I wish I had video of a particular play from the first half of the Charger/Phin game. I think Ronnie Brown or Rickie Williams caught a ball coming out of the backfield and proceeded to run across to Antonio Cromartie's side of the field. Cro' sized him up, 'broke down', lunged for the tackle......and absolutely WHIFFED! Cro' caught nothing but air. Luckily, Kevin Burnett was in hot pursuit and caught the Dolphin from behind a split second later. Antonio Cromartie's tackling efforts are akin to the SNL Mother Lover Video........extraordinarily-crap yourself-funny.

Steeler Week

What's Pittsburgh Steeler blog, One For The Other Thumb, saying about this week's game?

Excellent photoshops as always.

Stay classy OFTOT.

For more of Ron Burgundy and friends allow me to recommend, Bitches Love Smiley Faces. A stellar cover song--check it.

Can You Guess The One ESPN 'Expert' Who Actually Chose Carolina To Win On The Road Tonight In Dallas? You Better Be Able to!

So you've read the title to this post and undoubtedly you're glancing at the graphic trying to make sense of my question.

The graphic to the side is from ESPN's website but it's wholly inaccurate. It indicates that all of ESPN's analysts (and boy are there a lot of them) picked Dallas to Christen the new stadium with a win tonight.....but that's not what I saw on TV whilst watching the pregame. A lone 'expert' climbed out on to the limb of the crazy tree and prognosticated a Panther win in Big D.

Now look at that lineup.....EIGHT. Count 'em, EIGHT, 'experts' giving their predictions. Which fella chose the woeful Carolina Panthers to get a tough road victory in week 3. Look hard....

Who's the type of guy who would go completely against the grain despite the ignorant masses (me) guffawing at his every ill-timed, idiotic move?

Who's the guy who, year in and year out, proved the ol' adage that, "The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results."

How 'bout the guy who regularly substantiates the idea of the Peter Principle?

Have you still not guessed? ESPN baffles me with their hiring practices.....

Survivor Pool Week 3

With the masses polling heavily in favor of a Baltimore victory in my Survivor Pool this week I stood fast with my initial gut reaction to ride the Ravens.

When it was all said and done I felt GREAT.... great like Willis McGahee minus the illegitimate children.

Only one player eliminated this week (on account of laziness) so 6/12 remain. The following S.O.B.s are off the board:

• New England Patriots
• Minnesota Vikings
• Baltimore Ravens

I see those in the poll below as the best options. If you think there's another 'better play' then make a suggestion, with this caveat: I need new socks, the bills are coming due and if I can keep winning I can continue to write these easy posts with polls. Don't disappoint!

Charger Fan In Donkey Land: Week 3 Dolphins

Here we go again.

Another week with LT injured, and Merriman a non factor due to his groin injury.

We lean on .43 cent and Mr. English to step up for our two injured warriors.

.43 stepped up as expected, but our running game was dismal in not only the first half, but the entire game.

Was pleased to see the D step up after the first drive when they allowed the Dolphins to get down to the one.....which resulted in the Bolts winning the lottery with the fumble out of the back of the end zone. They seemed to stabilize as the former Enterprise Rent a Car Associate Nwagbuo showed up today and filled in reasonably well for Jamal.

We saw the offense opening up as expected with the injuries we have encountered early on. Seeing Malcom Floyd get the 46 yrd catch down the middle followed up on the following possession by the 50+ yrd catch by Vincent Jackson was what we can expect over the next few weeks. Let's not forget about Gates who had his fair share of catches today for a good amount of yrds. Also liked the screen to Naanee, and the fun with .43 tossing the ball back to Rivers for the completion to Gates.

Again today we had to witness the field goals vs. the touchdowns. Can not continue this lack of scoring. On top of that Nate can not be missing any, especially a 41 yarder to end the half and give us the lead.

Next week we will need the Defense to again step up big and we cannot settle for field goals. The Steelers will put up a fight on their home field, but as we have seen over the last two weeks they are not the Super Bowl team of '08 and their defense has shown that they have holes we can exploit with our passing game.

Sunday Night Football is the prime time for us to show our real colors.

Have a great week all, in preparation for our Sunday Night Showdown.

Go BOLTS!

Charger Fan in Donkey Land

Editor's Note:

• I'll choose to refer to Nwagbuo as Photo Unavailable rather than the Former Enterprise Rent A Car associate. Not a dig on the Spartan alum but more on the site administrators that can't seem to round up a head-shot. C'mon now!
  
• A win is a win....but I'm not bespectacled with the rose tinted variety like my compadre, the CFIDL. I'm still digesting...
  

Pre Game Week 3 Versus The Dolphins: SNL's Mother Lover Brings Perspective To This Ridiculous Fan

In the previous post I suggested that watching the Mother Lover video by Justin Timberlake and Andy Samberg was an apt descriptor of Charger Fan reactions following the home loss against Ray Lewis' will last week. If you haven't figured it out....I meant that both were funny.

Seriously. That Mother Lover song is hilarious sh*t....and for a moment it made me stop thinking about Norv's terrible play calling and even worse press conferences. While the video is funny so is the collective response of Charger fan. C'mon people......every year starts this way:
--Chargers lose.
--Fans crap themselves.
--Fans begin questioning Norv, AJ and every personnel move down to those final 53 man cuts.

We'd be well served to chill out for a moment...but I'd be remiss if I didn't mention the following:

The definition of ridiculously moronic and incredibly dimwitted is
to continue doing the same ridiculously moronic and incredibly dimwitted thing
and to expect a result
that is not
ridiculously moronic and incredibly dimwitted

I'm no Einstein so I can't tell you if it's him that I'm paraphrasing or if it's Edison or some other mad genius (hasn't Norv been described that way?). But the point I'm making is as follows: in order for me to simultaneously remove the noose from my neck, put the pills back in the medicine cabinet, and to trigger the safety on the 12 gauge sawed off, I need to see the coaching staff make some adjustments that account for the early injury losses we've sustained thus far.

On offense our running game and line play is suspect. So let's make sure we control the ball but also keep Franchise Phil safe by utilizing our giant receivers in a short west coast style passing adjustment. If we don't control the ball against Miami we may end up seeing a replay from the Miami/Indy game and by replay I'm not talking about a Miami loss.

On defense we've lost the center piece of the unit. Without Jamal we have to consider a serious overhaul as there's not a player on our roster who can replace him...and let's be honest, we weren't stopping the run even with the big fella in there against the Rai-duhs. What defensive adjustment will Ron Rivera make?

This isn't a must win but look to the future: a loss at home to Miami followed by a trip to Pittsburgh where regular season history has not been kind would be foreboding....1-3 going into the bye week. Yikes! We can say all we want that there's no reason to panic because we've overcome those odds in both the 2007 and 2008 seasons but it would also be foolhardy to compare the 2009 edition to either of those squads. In 2009, both the defense and rushing attacks are less than what they once were.

Besides; contenders win their home games.

Go Chargers!

Editor's Notes:

• Thank you for your input Faithful Eleven; Week 3 survivor pool = Baltimore Ravens!
• Is it to early to begin with advice from the Site Sages and installations of Voodoo. My sense is yes...but if Jessica Alba will start getting us wins I may have to make a concession.
• We do play in the AFC West.....so I suppose you can scrap the above diatribe.