Steelers Cut Hagans and McNeal, Sign Alexander and Smith

The Pittsburgh Steelers have yet to play their first preseason game but they continue to make roster moves, albeit at the bottom of the roster.

Gone are defensive end Cordial Hagans (not to be confused with Clark Haggans, we assure you) and running back Curits McNeal. Taking their places are running back Alvester Alexander and cornerback Devin Smith.

Of the two, Smith would appear to have a better shot at making the roster, or the practice squad for that matter, as the Steelers are facing a series of injuries at cornerback beginning with starter Cortez Allen. In addition to Allen, who had minor knee surgery, Curtis Brown has been injured, Demarcus Van Dyke has been out as well as rookie Terry Hawthorne.

Smith arrives to the NFL after making second-team All Big Ten at Wisconsin. He caught on as an undrafted rookie free agent with the the Dallas Cowboys, but he did not show Jason Garrett enough and was cut last week.

In contrast, this is Alexander's second summer of making the rounds of NFL training camps. Alexander played his college ball at Wisconsin and has spent time with the Bears, Colts, and the Titans.

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Cortez Allen Undergoes Surgery - Still Too Early to Hit the Panic Button....

As the Steelers 2013 training camp approaches the one week mark, injuries continue to lead the news, as Cortez Allen underwent minor surgery on his knee.

#Steelers cornerback Cortez Allen has had minor knee surgery.
— Dale Lolley (@dlolleyor) August 2, 2013

Dale Lolley also reported that it is his understanding that Allen suffers from a meniscus issue, although he could not confirm the news.

If that is the case, meniscus injures are relatively minor compared to ligament damage, and Mike Tomlin has said that he expects Allen to miss “a few weeks.”

Not Time to Hit the Panic Button Yet, But…

While the Steelers likely lost one of its most promising 2013 undrafted rookie free agents when offensive lineman Nik Embernate was carted off the field with what looked to be a season-ending injury, Pittsburgh is in better shape than some of the other teams around the league (see Dennis Pitta of the Ravens).

Allen has had 2 years in Dick LeBeau’s defense, and will likely return to practice well before the season opener.

• Still, for a team ravaged by injuries in both 2011 and 2012, the trend that is forming is not positive.

William Gay has assumed Allen’s slot at nickel back, and Allen’s injury presents and opportunity for Curtis Brown.

The Steelers selected Curtis Brown a in the 3rd round of the 2011 NFL Draft, and when Brown entered the NFL he was seen as more of a finished product than Allen, who the Steelers drafted in the 4th round in 2011. But while Brown has excelled on special teams, he also struggled last year when forced into the starting line up vs. San Diego (again, did anyone look good that day?)

Josh Victorian is also a likely beneficiary, as with Demarcus Van Dyke out he too will get more playing time.

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Steelers Cut Nigel Malone, Omar Hunter; Sign Ryan Steed, John Rabe

It is barely 24 hours after the Steelers first 2013 training camp practice in full pads, and already the NFL dream appears to be over for two youngsters. Ed Bouchette is reporting on PG Plus as is Steelers.com that the Pittsburgh Steelers have waived defensive tackle Omar Hunter and cornerback Nigel Malone.

• The attentive fan will remember that Malone struggled with Mike Tomlin’s opening day run test.

This of course does not mean that Malone’s difficulty cost him his dream, but clearly he did not help himself. Malone was originally signed to replace fellow cornerback Justin King. King fell victim to the Steelers infamous June curse, and was placed on injured reserve in June for undisclosed reasons.

But if the dream ends for some, for others it takes on new life. To take their places, the Steelers signed tight end John Rabe from Minnesota and cornerback Ryan Steed from Furman. According to Pro Football Reference, Ryan Steed spent time on the New Orelans Saints roster in 2012, although he accumulated no stats and did not appear in any games.

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The Pittsburgh Steelers 2013 Draft Class at a Glance

The 2013 NFL Draft is now history, and the Pittsburgh Steelers have 9 new players to show for their efforts. The Steelers entered the draft with serious needs at almost every position and depending on who you believed they either drafted for need, or were able to basically stick to their “best available” player philosophy while hitting their needs.

Neither answer will be terribly relevant as long as they players they picked pan out. Some of course will fail (think Limas Sweed), others will suffer misfortune in the form of injury (think Sean Spence,) while others yet will likely go on to exceed expectations (think Aaron Smith).

Here’s a snap shot of the 9 mean that Kevin Colbert and Mike Tomlin deemed worthy of a shot at becoming Pittsburgh Steelers.

Pittsburgh Steelers 2013 Draft Class:
(click on the names below for capsule profiles and/or video highlights of

1. Jarvis Jones, Outside Linebacker, Georgia
2. Le’von Bell, Running Back, Michigan State
3. Markus Wheaton, Wide Receiver, Oregon State
4. Shamarko Thomas, Safety, Syracuse
4. Landry Thomas, quarterback, Okalahoma
5. Terry Hawthorne, Cornerback, Illinois 
6. Vince Williams, Inside Linebacker, Florida State University
6. Justin Brown, Wide Receiver, Okalahoma
7. Nicholas Williams, Defensive End, Samford

How the Class of 2013 Fits In

Regular readers knows that Steel Curtain Rising neither grades drafts nor evaluates individual draft picks. Such exercises are understandable, but day after draft evaluation is about as valuable as an opening day batting average.

Look back no further to the Steelers 2008 Draft, which the “experts” uniformly thought was a good draft the day after. Five years later the Steelers 2008 Draft looks quite different.

Potentially the Steelers have give themselves the ability to improve play making on the defense, bolstered their running back corps, and injected speed into their wide receiving corps. Markus Wheaton figures to give the Steelers needed depth at safety and could become a possible successor to Troy Polamalu and/or Ryan Clark.

Beyond that, the rest of the class realistically will hope to exit St. Vincents having shown they can contribute enough on special teams to merit a roster spot.

Certainly Vince Williams could cost Stevenson Sylvester, Adrian Robinson and/or Chris Carter a roster spot. Justin Brown could force Jerricho Cotchery and/or Plaxico Burress to seek out what Chuck Noll referred to as “Life’s Work.” Nicholas Williams could cost Al Woods a roster spot.

Or maybe not….

A Shot at a Dream of a Life Time

…But all of that sorting out can wait until the sun shines down on Latrobe.

For now each of these nine men have been given a shot at a dream that all of us shared the first time we touched a Nerf football, called out the cadence of a meaningless snap count, and argued over whether there should be a 3 or 5 Mississippi rush.

At this moment congratulations are in order for the Pittsburgh Steelers 2013 Draft Class. Congratulations gentleman, good luck, and welcome to Steelers Nation.

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Steelers Draft Shamarko Thomas, Syracuse Safety in 4th. Video Highlights

As the third day of the 2013 NFL Draft opened the Pittsburgh Steelers pivoted back to defense and they did it in an uncharacteristic way.

Realizing that the days of Troy Polamalu and/or Ryan Clark are numbered and unable to get a safety in rounds 1-3, the Steelers traded their 3rd round pick of the 2014 NFL Draft to the Cleveland Browns to move up to pick Syracuse Safety Shamarko Thomas.

Thomas was one of the Steelers pre draft visits, and while he only stands at 5’11”, considered short for an NFL safety, at 217 pounds he’s earned a reputation as a ferocious hitter.

Steelers secondary coach Carnell Lake, himself a former strong safety for the Steelers, could not say enough good things about Thomas, explaining:

Shamarko is an outstanding football player. I think if he had two more inches he would have been in the first round. Not only can he play safety, but he can also get up there and play man-to-man on the slot receiver. He has played nickel, and he has played corner at times.

From video that is available of Thomas, it is easy to see why his secondary coach is happy to have him (note, this would not be my choice of audio; available as of 4/27/13):




Lake of course would have a particularly appreciation for safeties who can play cornerback, as he himself made the shift in both 1995 and 1997, saving the Steelers seasons both times as a result.

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Steelers Draft Terry Hawthorne, Cornerback from Illinois in 5th Round of NFL Draft

Although the Pittsburgh Steelers do not lack for bodies at cornerback, they are taking no chances drafting cornberback Terry Hawthorne of Illinos in the 5th round of the 2013 NFL Draft.

The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reported that Carnell Lake compared Hawthorne to incumbent Steelers starter Ike Taylor, although he also characterized him as a “fast raw prospect.”

Hawthorne stands at 6’ and weighs in at 190 pounds, here is a brief highlight sketch of him from the Illinois OSU Game (available as of 4/27/13):



Joining the Steelers as a 5th round pick in no way guarantees Terry Hawthorne a roster spot. He will need to earn one. Ike Taylor is of course going no where and neither is projected starter Cortez Allen, nor will the Steelers cut William Gay after resigning him.

That means that Hawthorne will need to beat out Courtney Brown, Justin King, Josh Victorian, DeMarcus Van Dyke and Isaiah Green.

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Pittsburgh Steelers 2013 Draft Needs Matrix

Depending on whose mock draft you read, during the 2013 NFL Draft the Pittsburgh Steelers are set to take:

• Linebacker Jarvis Jones of Georgia, and if not…
• Safety Kenny Vaccar of Texas, and if not…
• Tight End Tyler Eifert from Notre Dame, and if not…
• Cornerback Dee Milliner from Alabama, and if not…
• Wide Receiver Tavon Austin from West Virginia, and if not…
• Safety Eric Reid from LSU

…And if its not one of the above players the Steelers certainly will take some other highly hyped college prospect in the first round.

Of course you know all of that.

Now here’s something you’re not likely to read on any other Steelers site, with or without a mock draft:

• Steel Curtain Rising will neither offer an opinion on who the Steelers will or should draft

Regular readers know this blog is based in Buenos Aires, Argentina, where suffice to say college football is not a sports programming priority. (Neither is the NFL, but at least there’s the Sunday Ticket.) Truth be told, I never followed the college game much when I still lived in the US.

But what I can do is focus on the Steelers Needs...

Breaking Down the Steelers 2013 NFL Draft Needs

...And needs the Steelers have a plenty. Unlike previous years, you have to go all the way to kickers and punters to find an area the Steelers can safely avoid in the draft.

Here’s another confession. Due to time constraints, I was not planning on doing individual needs analysis, but there was no way to construct a Steelers Draft Needs Matrix without doing so.

Even then evaluating the Steelers 2013 Draft Needs is difficult because of the conflict between short-term and long-term needs. The Steelers have both, and they don’t always over lap.

The temptation on the South Side to focus on the short term has to be strong.

• Kevin Colbert, Mike Tomlin and Art Rooney II must resist that temptation.

Focusing on short term needs is one of the things that caused the Steelers Dynasty of the 70’s to collapse under its own weight. With so many entrenched Super Bowl starters, Dick Haley, Art Rooney Jr. and yes, Chuck Noll, stopped focusing on taking the best player available, and drafted with any eye toward their depth chart, out thinking themselves into going for guys that other teams some how missed on.

Heaven only knows how many future Pro Bowlers the Steelers passed on in the late 1970’s based on the assumption that “there’s no way this kid can beat out Dwight White, even if he is getting old….”

Worse yet, focusing on the short term can cause a team to reach, as it did in the 1999 Draft when they picked Troy Edwards and Scott Shields 1 and 2, both men turning out to be horrendous busts.

And let’s acknowledge that the temptation for this kind of thinking has to be strong, given that Ben Roethlisberger’s window as a viable Super Bowl quarterback could be narrowing quickly, if the injuries of the past two seasons are any indication.

• But focus on the long term the Steelers must.

2013 Steelers Draft-Needs Matrix

And that brings us to the Steelers 2013 Draft Needs Matrix.

This matrix is not intended to suggest that the Steelers should target (aka “reach”) for players in this particular order. Rather, it is intended to guide the choice that must be made when the clock begins ticking, and there are two players of equal, or near equal, value on the board.

In developing this Steelers Draft Needs Matrix, absolute need is balanced against long term vs. short term need, with long term need getting the higher priority.

In that respect, safety takes precedence over linebacker, simply because the Steelers are order and thinner at safety with virtual novices playing behind Troy Polamalu and Ryan Clark.

And outside linebacker takes precedence over inside linebacker because there’s just a little more depth and a few more players under contract for a longer time than at inside linebacker, and so on down the line.

Steelers 2013 Draft-Needs Matrix:
(click on the position title for a detailed needs analysis)

• Safety takes precedence over Outside Linebacker
• Outside Linebacker takes precedence over Inside Linebacker
• Inside Linebacker take precedence over tight end and wide receiver
• Tight End (barely) takes precedence over Wide Receiver
• Wide Receiver takes precedence over running back
• Running Back takes precedence over defensive line
• Defensive Line takes precedence over offensive line
• Offensive Line takes precedence over cornerback
• Cornerback takes precedence over Quarterback

And for heaven sakes, the Steelers should not even be thinking of drafting a kicker!

Note, however, that there is a very, very fine line separating the needs outlined below. Really, the Steelers needs, long and short term, at any of the positions mentioned above save for quarterback could merit a first round pick if the right man is available.

It’s not likely that a top ten prospect like David DeCastro could fall to the Steelers as happened last year or as happened in 1987 with Rod Woodson, but that’s the beauty of the draft.

Enjoy the 2013 NFL, my fellow citizens of Steelers Nation because our beloved Black and Gold’s ability to bagging Lombardi Number Seven during the Roethlisberger era likely depends on Mike Tomlin and Kevin Colbert getting this draft right.

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Steelers Draft Needs: Time to Hit the Safety Valve

Previous NFL Drafts of the Kevin Colbert-Mike Tomlin era have seen the Pittsburgh Steelers focus on defensive lineman (2009 and 2011), offensive lineman (2010-2012), cornerbacks (2011), and wide receivers (2010).

But there has been one area of need that the Steelers have consistently ignored, albeit often times due to circumstances beyond their control. And that position is Safety.

• The Steelers must address their needs at Safety in the 2013 NFL Draft

With a healthy Ryan Clark and Troy Polamalu the Steelers probably still boast the NFL’s best starting safety tandem even with both men on the wrong side of thirty.

• But that later reality is something the Steelers no longer have the luxury of ignoring. 

The Steelers had seemed to be grooming a safety in the form of Lee Flowers or Myron Bell in recent seasons. That safety was Ryan Mundy. It would be wrong to scapegoat Mundy for the woes that bedeviled the Steelers defense in early 2012, but things only began to get righted when they benched Mundy.

The fact that Mundy got beaten out by thirtysomething Will Allen did not bode well for his future in Pittsburgh.

• But that’s an academic question now as both Mundy and Allen have new homes in the NFC East.

That leaves the Steelers with Robert Golden, an undrafted rookie free agent from 2012, and Damon Cromartie-Smith.

Neither man has seen much action and both will have to fight for roster spots under the hot summer sun at St. Vincents in Latrobe.

(They also have someone named Ross Ventrone under a futures contract who doesn't even have a jeresy number assigned to him, no doubt to keep him from showing up on Joe Flacco's scouting reports.)

• The Steelers need an injection of youth and talent at safety, and this is not simply a long term need.

As Tim Gleason, aka “Mary Rose” from Behind the Steel Curtain has written, Troy Polamalu is like a European sports car – an ultimate driving machine when not in the shop.

In years past Polamalu’s health ran hot and cold. Healthy in 2006, not so healthy in 2007. Healthy in 2008, injured for all but a sliver of 2009.

But that too has changed. Polamalu stayed healthy for the bulk of 2010, helping seal victory with any number of dramatic, just in time interceptions. Yet, he was injured for the playoffs when the Steelers could have used his heroics.

2012 told an opposite tale. Polamalu started off hurt, when the Steelers needed him, but finished the season in strong, and appeared to just be returning to form for the playoffs, which of course the Steelers missed.

Who knows? Perhaps Polamalu will find a way stay healthy, and perhaps he and Ryan Clark can defy Father Time the way, say Darrell Green or for that matter Rod Woodson did. That would be great.

• But the Steelers can't count on that, and drafting a safety who can come in and immediately work himself into 3rd and 4th down packages not a want but a need.

The Steelers need to address safety in the 2013 NFL Draft, they need to do it early. And this is one pick they need to get right.

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List of the Pittsburgh Steelers (Known) Pre-Draft Visits

Just like every other NFL team, the Pittsburgh Steelers spent much of April entertaining NCAA collegiate football players in advance of the 2013 NFL Draft.

At first the stream of news of players making visits to Pittsburgh in advance of the NFL Draft was steady, and it was clear that the Steelers were interested in linebackers.  Or they were trying to fake the rest of the NFL into think linebacker was a priority. Then, as pointed out in a recent edition of Steel Curtain Rising’s Watch Tower, the news stopped.

For some undisclosed reason, the Steelers abruptly stopped making announcements on which college players were making visits to the South Side in advance of the 2013 NFL Draft.

However, bloggers who were willing to roll up their proverbial sleeves and sort through Twitter feeds and the like could get some insight on additional pre-Draft visits to the Steelers.

To that end, Steel Curtain Rising has compiled the following list of college players who visited the Steelers South Side complex prior to the 2013 NFL Draft.

College Running Backs Visiting the Steelers
Christine Michael, Texas A&M
Johnathan Franklin, UCLA
Le’Veron Bell, Michigan State
Eddie Lacy, Alabama

College Offensive Tackles Visiting the Steelers
Nik Embernate, San Diego State University

College Linebackers Visiting the Steelers
John Simon, OSU (Ohio State University)
Vince Williams, FSU (Florida State University)
Jarvus Jones, University of Georgia
James Collins, Southern Mississippi University
Khaseem Greene, Rutgers University
Michael Mauti, Penn State
Malliciah Goodman, Clemson University
Sio Moore, University of Connecticut

College Wide Receivers Visiting the Steelers
Josh Boyce, TCU (Texas Christian University)
Justin Brown, Okalahoma University
Tavarres King, University of Georgia

College Cornerbacks Visiting the Steelers
Blidi Wreh-Wilson, University of Connecticut
Xavier Rhodes, FSU
B.W. Web, William and Mary University
Tharold Simon, LSU (Louisiana State University)

College Safeties Visiting the Steelers
Jonathn Meeks, Clemson University
Philip Thomas, Fresno State University
Shamarko Thomas, Syracuse University
Will Davis, Utah State
Duke Williams, University of Nevada

That’s a list of 25. Per NFL rules, the Steelers were allowed to invite up to 30 college players to make visits prior to the 2013 NFL Draft. So the identities of five other players, in addition to whatever players they invited in from Pitt, are unknown.

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Cowboys Court Steelers Safety Will Allen

When free agency opened the Pittsburgh Steelers moved quickly to resign current players Ramon Foster, Plaxico Burress, David Johnson, former players William Gay and Matt Spaeth, and outsider Bruce Gradkowski.

• But since making those early moves the franchise has shifted into low gear.

The cap strapped Steelers strategy at this point is to see what they can get in the coming NFL Draft and sign players afterwards, and that includes resigning some of their own players who remain on the open market. (Charlie Batch is one such player.)

However, by working out reserve safety Will Allen, the Dallas Cowboys put the Steelers on notice yesterday that not everyone the Steelers assumed would be available will be there.

The Steelers already lost an “we can probably get him back because we assume that no one else wants him” type free agent when Ryan Mundy signed with the New York Giants.

Will Allen was a similar type player, having played very little during his time in Pittsburgh, save for the 2012 season when he replaced the younger Mundy – to the defense’s benefit.

As the Dallas Morning News makes clear, the Cowboys couldn’t sign Allen now if they wanted to as the team is more cap strapped than the Steelers. But they wouldn’t bring him in for a workout if they were not interested.

Now, no serious Steelers commentator is going to write “Steelers Lose Will Allen. Super Bowl Window Now Shut.” But with that said, Allen is the only veteran safety with experience in Dick LeBeau’s system backing up Troy Polamalu and Ryan Clark.

Dale Lolley, the only Pittsburgh journalist to report Allen’s visit, ironically, or perhaps not so ironically, has the Steelers picking safety Kenny Vacarro from Texas in the first round of the coming 2013 NFL Draft.

Regardless of whether it comes in the first round or later, the Steelers must get younger at safety in the coming NFL draft.

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Steelers Lose Lewis to Saints, Mundy to Giants

Now it starts to hurt. The Pittsburgh Steelers lost Mike Wallace and Rashard Mendenhall in rapid succession on days one and two of free agency. Both moves hurt the team, but both were expected.

• Day three brought the defections of Keenan Lewis to the New Orleans Saints and Ryan Mundy to the New York Giants. 

Keenan Lewis’ departure was some what expected, particularly after the Steelers resigned William Gay, after William Gay’s release from Pittsburgh West, aka the Arizona Cardinals.

But it Keenan Lewis defection nonetheless hurts and hurts badly. After languishing deep down the Steelers bench in 2009 and 2010, and looking almost every part the misfit, Keenan Lewis blossomed under the tutelage of Carnell Lake.

In 2011 he rose to third down back and in 2012 he became a starter and with each week he seemed to surpass himself in his ability to defend passes. Indeed, by year’s end Lewis led the league in passes defensed.

• This is normally the kind of player the Steelers would lock up to a long term deal

But circumstances are not quite normal, Art Rooney II’s protests to the contrary.

The Pittsburgh Steelers are in salary cap purgatory and are trying to avoid salary cap hell – a situation where management would be required to essentially liquate the team to stay under the cap, and their ability to offer long term, big bonus deals is limited.

By all accounts Keenan Lewis’ contract in New Orleans was not break the bank level. But the Steelers are already projecting Cortez Allen as next year’s starter and hence the team’s next big investment at corner. On the opposite side the team has big money invested in Ike Taylor, who is aging.

In a perfect world they’d lock Lewis down with an eye towards starting him and Allen in 2014 or 2015.

Instead, the Steelers calculate that the trio of Allen, Gay and Taylor can give them more bang for their salary cap buck in 2013 while hoping for the best after that.

What Mundy's Move Means

Ryan Mundy’s decision to sign with the New York Giants was a minor surprise, but as mentioned in our free agent focus article on Ryan Mundy, its perhaps time for the Steelers to cut their losses with Mundy, who saw himself demoted behind veteran Will Allen.

The move nonetheless robs the Steelers of the final member of their 2008 Draft Class, something which Steel Curtain Rising will be focusing on in the near future.

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Steelers Insurance Policy at Safety aka Will Allen Paid Dividends in 2012 - What Comes Next?

The Steelers secondary finished 2009 as a shell shocked unit unable to stop or make a big play. When something similar happened in 2002 the Steelers brass responded by maneuvering to bring in Troy Polamalu in the 2003 NFL Draft.

• In the winter of 2010 Mike Tomlin responded by dipping back into the secondary he’d coached down in Tampa Bay and signing safety Will Allen.

For two seasons the decision to bring Will Allen in as part of their mini-2010 free agent signing spree looked like one of the league’s all time ho-hum free agent moves. For two years Allen did little more than play special teams and do some limited spot duty at safety.

Allen remained an insurance policy as the Steelers focused on developing Ryan Mundy as Polamalu and Ryan Clark’s understudy. In any number of fan-based salary cap discussions during the 2012 off season, Allen was universally considered expendable.

However, you take out insurance policies to guard against unplanned events. And in 2012 the unplanned event was the dead end that Ryan Mundy reached in his development. (Click here for the Steelers 2013 Free Agent Focus article on Ryan Mundy.)

With Troy Polamalu ailing and Ryan Mundy wailing (sorry, couldn’t resist), Will Allen stepped in to start 7 games and in the process stabilized the Steelers secondary.

Although he wears 26, no one would ever confuse Will Allen’s ability to make the impact of a Deshea Townsend let alone that of Rod Woodson, but the Steelers defense got better as the season wore on, and Allen’s steady hand helped that.

• His best game, statistically, came vs. Washington where he defended 3 passes in an effort that shut down Robert Griffin III.

Now Allen is a free agent and he’ll be 31 before training camp. What should the Steelers do?

• Ideally they’d replace Allen with a younger player with the potential to develop into a starter. The Pittsburgh Steelers must inject youth at safety. 

But that doesn’t mean that Allen won’t have a place on the 2013 Steelers. He’s not likely to field a lot of offers on the free agent market, and the Steelers likely have the luxury of making off season personnel moves at back up safety on their timetable.

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Keenan Lewis Now Likely to Leave Pittsburgh as Free Agent

If William Gay’s return to the Steelers signals Keenan Lewis’ exit, Lewis will leave Pittsburgh haven proven two things:

• While history often serves as a useful guide, those who live in the present ultimately write their own history
• Position coaches can and do make a difference in the NFL

Keenan Lewis was one of three third round picks from the Steelers in the 2009 NFL Draft along with Mike Wallace and Kraig Urbik. Yet, it was fifth round pick Joe Burnett that got all of the attention and playing time in what was one of the most trying times for a Steelers secondary in recent memory.

Injuries kept Lewis out of all but three games in that season, yet he came back strong in training camp the following summer in Latrobe. He looked so go that it was said he might challenge for a starting job – until he actually got his audition in Denver.

Lewis flopped badly and took out his frustrations on a sign in the Broncos locker room, an act which Mike Tomlin forced him to pay for. 2010 was tough for Keenan Lewis, he only played in nine games and then mainly on special teams in spite of Bryant McFadden’s struggles at corner.

Keenan Lewis Writes His Own History

By the summer of 2011 most of Steelers Nation had given up on Lewis. History was also against him. A quick survey of Steelers 3rd round picks showed that if they hadn’t shown “something” by the end of their second season, they never would (click here for the comparison between Keenan Lewis and previous third round picks).

A number of Steelers coaches had apparently also come to that conclusion. Fortunately for both the franchise and Lewis, newly installed defensive backs coach Carnell Lake wasn’t one of them.

Lake allowed Lewis to start with a clean slate, and Lewis rewarded his coach’s faith. By the time the Steelers had broken camp at St. Vincent’s Lewis had shown he could play, and by beginning of the season he’d earned a spot in the 3rd down rotation.

Lewis didn’t come on gang busters in 2011, but played well, breaking up passes and making a game-saving interception on Monday night vs. Kansas City.

William Gay’s departure to Pittsburgh West aka Arizona opened a starting spot and Keenan Lewis fought through injury to fend of a fierce challenge from Cortez Allen and won the starting spot.

Again, Lewis rewarded the coach’s faith in him by transforming himself into a one man pass defending machine. Week after week Lewis seemed to make odds-defying pass break up after odds-defying pass break up. By season’s end Lewis had 23 passes defensed – that’s ten more than Ike Taylor and only two less than Taylor’s career best in 2005 (source Steelers.com).

• Not bad for a player labeled a bust after his “sophomore” NFL season.

Lewis benefited from what my friend Ivan Cole from Behind the Steel Curtain has called the “Lake Effect.” Credit Carnell Lake for having the faith and the ability to teach Lewis to play corner in NFL. But Lewis couldn’t have done so without ignoring the naysayers and simply focusing on playing football.

Do the Steelers Have the Cash to Keep Keenan…?

The downside is that Keenan Lewis is budding into a top NFL cornerback just as he’s reaching free agency. In the past, the Steelers have made it a point to try to sign players like Lewis before they hit the open market.

They haven’t done that here. Last summer such a move would have been too risky, and now the Steelers need to guard their salary cap dollars closely and Kevin Colbert has indicated Lewis will be allowed test the waters.

Prior to William Gay’s return, what was to happen to Lewis was anyone’s guess.

• Dejan Kovacevic of the Tribune Review nailed it when he said the Steelers need to pick a number for Lewis and stick to it

The same logic holds true now, except that the number the Steelers pick will be far, far lower.

• One of the clear lessons of the NFL’s salary cap age is that you can’t over pay.

Ideally Lewis can and would be an asset to the Steelers for years to come. But for as strong as Lewis has come on, Cortez Allen has come on even stronger, and could conceivably wrest the starting job from Lewis.

There’s no reason to pay a back up starter money if you don’t have to, and the Steelers are paying William Gay back up money.

Keeping Keenan Lewis would be a great success story for Carnell Lake and the Steelers secondary, but hard to imagine Lewis will not command an average salary that trends towards 8 figures on the open market.

That’s simply going to be out of the Steelers price range.

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Sorting Through the Steelers Opening Day Loss to the Broncos

Peyton Manning has dominated the NFL passing game for over a decade. During that time no defense has been as consistently dominant as the Pittsburgh Steelers. Manning sat out all of 2011 with an injury while the Steelers ranked up the NFL’s number 1 pass defense.

What better combination for the marquee match ups that the NFL reserves for Sunday Nights? Unfortunately for Steelers Nation, only one dominator showed up.

Tale of Two Halves

There is perhaps no one player to forces opponents to game plan from him more than Peyton Manning. He isn’t simply a playmaker, he’s an offense maker, and if you doubt that see how badly the Colts imploded in his absence.

The Steelers have faced off against Manning before.

Absent a strong pass defense in 2002, the Steelers quite simply took advantage of Manning’s mistakes, with Brett Alexander and Mike Logan picking him off three times, as the Steelers won 28-10.

During the 2005 regular season a Manning capitalized on Steelers miscues and turnovers to tune of a 26 to 7 drubbing.

In the playoffs however, the Steelers returned to Indy with a little different game plan. That plan  entailed unleashing their secret weapon, Ben Roethlisberger to jump to a quick lead and then sit on the ball. (The plan of course worked to perfection, until Jerome Bettis came within a shoe string tackle of his career ending in disaster.)

• This time around Todd Haley and Mike Tomlin’s plan focused on one thing:  Ball Control.

Let the record reflect that the Steelers plan worked to perfection, during the first half.

The Steelers defense forced the Broncos offense to punt twice and forced and then recovered a fumble.

On the two drives where the Steelers forced Denver to punt, Larry Foote and Jason Worilds registered sacks

• That’s no coincidence. 

And unfortunately, Worild’s sack near the end of the first quarter was pretty much the last time a Steelers defender even breathed on Number 18.

The next time Manning touched the ball, he went 6-7 as he marched his team down the field 80 yards for a go ahead touchdown.

• The Steelers answered with a touchdown of their own.

By the time Manning got the ball back, all had time for was to take a knee and head for the locker room. That would be his past passive act of the evening....

The Half Time Momentum Shift that Never Was...

All of that should have been a good thing.

As everyone knows, scoring a touchdown right before the half is all important as it gives you a momentum shift heading into the locker room. The momentum shift is amplified when you get the ball to start the next half.

Network commentators always remind viewers of this fact. What’s more they’re on to something when they say that such momentum shifts are decisive. Except for when they're not.

Count Sunday Night in Denver as an occurrence of one of those “occasions when no decisive momentum  shift occurs” (try running that through your redundancy filter.)

• One almost has to wonder if Steelers coaches saw Manning’s first touchdown drive and feared they’d awakened a sleeping giant.

Because Todd Haley and his offensive players seemed determined to ensure that Manning did not touch the ball again.

• And they made a good run of it as the Steelers offense possessed the ball for all but 21 seconds of the second half’s first 16 minutes.

The plan might have worked, had the Steelers defense been able to stop Manning from throwing Demetrius Thomas, the accomplice to January’s Tebowing of the Steelers, a 71 yard touchdown pass in that brief span of 21 seconds.

That 21 second was pretty much characteristic of Peyton Manning on the entire second half. Ditto the a Steelers defense whose:

• Defensive lineman couldn’t get penetration or control their gaps
• Linebackers didn’t get pressure on the quarterback
• Defensive backs who could neither cover nor threaten to create a turnover

Outside of that, Dick LeBeau’s defense looked every bit ready to take their place alongside some of his other legendary units.

Not Quite Like the Good Old Days

Its understandable that a good chunk of Steelers Nation is a mite bit taken aback by an opening day loss. Until the Debacle in Baltimore last year, there had not been one in Roethlisberger era.

Things were not always such, however.

Opening day losses were a staples of the Cowher years

These weren’t simple losses, but thrashings.

• San Francisco began the trend in 1993
• Dallas inflicted two, in 1994 and 1997
• Jacksonville likewise was a repeat offender in 1996 and 2001
• Baltimore did the honors in 2000, shutting the Steelers out at home
• New England followed suit in 2002

The attentive reader will note (and if you’re read this far, you must be attentive) that each of those was a winning season, all but one were playoff years, and three of those years ended in the AFC Championship.

• Opening day wins in 1998, 1998 and 2003 turned out to be harbingers of doom, or at least mediocrity. 

The moral of this history lesson is that it doesn't pay to get too worked up over an opening day loss. With that said there’s something bothersome about the Denver loss.

Haley’s offense, while a work in progress, flashed signs of greatness, greatness that the Steelers might be able to realize if they can go a whole game without losing an offensive lineman.

Unlike the losses mentioned above, the Steelers defense didn’t get dominated physically so much as it got out foxed. Peyton Manning simultaneously checkmated Dick LeBeau off the field while playing a constant game of chicken with Troy Polamalu on the field and winning each time.

Now, one would think mental errors are more easily corrected that a lack of physicality. After all, its easier to teach guys to correct their mistakes than to grow them bigger and stronger.

But 48 hours plus after the game, it doesn't feel that way, my gut is telling me the opposite.

Let’s hope that Mike Tomlin will prove me wrong.

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David DeCastro to IR, Steelers Sign DeMarcus Van Dyke

Just yesterday Steel Curtain Rising opined that the Steelers were acting wisely in delaying their decision to put David DeCastro on the IR list.

The logic was that prudence was warranted, there was no need to hurry to put DeCastro on IR, lest a higher-value starter were to get injured. And besides, no one was going to sign Trai Essex, and by signing him after the Broncos game, the Steelers would avoid being on the hook for his salary for the entire year.

The Steelers did put David DeCastro on the injured reserve list today, and they did it because they signed another player. Except it wasn’t Essex.

The Steelers signed DeMarcus Van Dyke Friday, who had been cut earlier in the week by the Oakland Raiders.

The Raiders drafted Van Dyke in the third round of the 2011 NFL Draft, making him the 81st player overall taken. To put that into context that’s 14 picks higher than Curtis Brown and 47 picks higher than Cortez Allen, the Steelers 3rd and 4th round picks for the 2011 NFL Draft.

Van Dyke played in 12 games for the Raiders last year, starting in 4 contests on the NFL’s 27th ranked pass defense. Vic Tafur of the San Francisco Chronicle discussed Van Dyke’s fall from grace:

Van Dyke, drafted in what was a bit of a reach in the third round last year, played in 14 games with four starts, recording 13 tackles, four passes defended and one interception. He was the fastest player at the NFL combine, running a 4.28 40-yard dash. 

He played well the first two weeks of training camp, routinely breaking up pass plays, but struggled once the preseason games started. Against Arizona, he got beaten twice on deep passes and missed a tackle on a running play that resulted in a touchdown.

Lake Reclamation Project?

Van Dyke raw athletic talent is evident. The Raiders have been cleaning house in the secondary, and one must wonder if they gave up on him too soon, even if they discovered he was a reach.

A year ago there was another third round corner who’d done little to justify his high draft status. He’d been written off as a little more than a place holder on a unit that was unquestionably a team’s weak link.

• Everyone in the organization had given up on him. Everyone except for one man, the new secondary coach.

The player was Keenan Lewis, the Steelers third round pick from 2009 NFL Draft. History said it was past now or never time for Lewis, but Carnell Lake wasn’t buying into any of it.

Carnell Lake worked with Lewis individually. Lewis improved dramatically, notching the game-sealing interception vs. Kansas City last year, and will start for the Steelers Sunday vs. the Broncos.

Will DeMarcus Van Dyke benefit similarly from the “Lake Effect?” Time will tell.

But if he doesn’t, it won’t be for lack of quality coaching.

Essex to Return Anyway?

Just because Van Dyke is here does not mean that Essex won’t be back. Behind their starting front five, the Steelers only have Mike Adams, Doug Legursky, and Kelvin Beachum.

Expect another roster move next week to clear space for Trai Essex to return.

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Gilreath, Clemons, and Cromartie-Smith Headline Steelers Practice Squad - Jerrod Jackson Left Off...

Having cut their roster to 53 men, the Pittsburgh Steelers completed their eight man practice squad, which includes:

John Malecki, offensive linemen
Ryan Lee, offensive lineman
David Gilreath, wide receiver
Toney Clemons, wide receiver
Jamie McCoy, tight end
Marshall McFadden, linebacker
Damon Cromartie-Smith, safety
Josh Victorian, cornerback

Conspicious by their absence are defensive lineman Corbin Bryant - who saw active service with the Steelers last year, running back DeJuan Harris, and of course quarterback Jerrod Jackson. Each of these men either looked sharp in preseason. However, the Steelers practice squad picks closely mirror the areas of need on their depth chart.

For the first time in recent memory, the Steelers are only carrying 5 wide receivers on their active roster, explaining the presence of preseason star David Gilreath and 7th round draft pick Toney Clemons.

As the Steelers current and past experiences have aptly demonstraited, you can never have too many offensive lineman familiar with your system, hence the presence of Malecki and Lee.

The Steelers are likewise thin at cornerback, likely explaining Josh Victorian's presence, and Damon Cromartie-Smith gives the Steelers options at safety.

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Steelers 2012 Draft Need Matrix

Unlike other sites, Steel Curtain Rising has no inner Mel Kipper Jr. to channel. Here you’ll find no mock drafts, analysis of hypothetical trade values, or doomsday scenarios.

Those are all great, and to my fellow colleagues in the blogging community, I say have at it!

But I make no pretense of pretending to know or even have an educated guess on who the Steelers should pick and who they should avoid in the draft. College football is not shown here in Buenos Aires, even if you have Direct TV, and even when I lived in the United States, I never followed it. Nothing against it, just never had a rooting interest. (Now, if Loyola Maryland ever gets a football team... Watch out.)

What I can do, however, is give you an analysis of the Steelers needs. If you’ve been following, you’ll know that I’ve broken down the Steelers by position area, evaluating what they need at tight end and quarterback, running back and wide receiver, offensive line, defensive line, linebacker, and secondary.

But how does that all fit together? Well, that’s what Steel Curtain Rising's annual Steelers draft need matrix is all about. If, in a given situation the Steelers find multiple players of the same grade on their draft board, who do they pick?

Mind you, the Steelers, at least since Kevin Colbert arrived, have rarely allowed their draft decisions to be driven by need. But, for as much as they might protest to the contrary, need does come into their equation, even if its not the prime consideration.

This year’s draft matrix has an odd shape, thin at both ends and fat in the middle.

Steelers First Tier Draft Needs

The Steelers have to urgent needs. They need to continue to rebuild their offensive line, and they need to begin grooming a successor to Casey Hampton.

Fate might complicate that mission in this draft, as we are told there are few quality nose tackles. And that’s where this gets tricky.

Because the Steelers only need one nose tackle, yet they need to field five offensive lineman and could conceivably upgrade any of the the four exterior line positions, with a quality first round pick.

And while the Steelers need at guard is greater than it is at tackle, I lump to two together, because if the Steelers get a good tackle Willie Colon can make the oft-discussed move to his so called natural position of guard (which he has never played.)

So the temptation to reach for a nose tackle, given the dearth of talent in this draft, has got to be great.

But the Steelers First Tier Draft Matrix goes like this:

Offensive line takes priority over nose tackle, by a nose (pun intended)

Second Steelers Draft Needs

The second tier is very fat indeed. For once you can believe Kevin Colbert when he says that everything (or almost everything) is fair game after the first round.

That’s because while the Steelers don’t have many gaping holes to fill, just about every position area either has depth issues, age issues, or injury issues.

Still, it is possible to sort out some information from the noise.

Safety takes priority over inside linebacker, which takes priority over outside linebacker, which takes priority over running back, which takes priority over cornerback, which takes priority over wide receiver, which takes priority over defensive end.

Wow, that is a complicated web to unweave. But here goes. The Steelers are aging at safety, and their only young back up will be a free agent this time next year.

With question marks about both Jason Worilds and Stevenson Sylvester, inside linebacker gets the nod over outside linebacker because of Lawrence Timmons inconsistency.

You could make the argument that running back and outside linebacker should be switched, I will not argue, but I lean that way because the Steelers have bodies at running back and the NFL favors that pass more and more every year.

The need for a good corner is evident as is the need for good wideouts. The corner gets the nod because they have less proven talent that wideout.

Lastly, the Steelers don’t have tons of depth at defensive end, particularly if Ziggy Hood is to move to nose tackle for some portion of the 2012 or 2013 season. But with 2 out of the last three first being defensive ends it is hard to put this higher in the pecking order.

Steelers Third Tier Draft Needs

Tight ends takes priority over quarterback.

This one should be pretty self evident. IT would be great if the Steelers could get a tight end similar to those that New England has. But they have more pressing needs to address.

Ditto quarterback. I’d love nothing more than to draft a guy, bring him along and “develop” him the way coaches used to (at least on paper.)

But the Steelers have spent a couple of three 5th round picks on quarterbacks (Tee Martin, Brian St. Pierre, Omar Jacobs, and Dennis Dixon). With the exception of Dixon, none of them did more than hold a clipboard (which, well, isn’t a bad thing to say about your third string QB). In the case of Dixon, if the Steelers really saw some him as a viable long-term back up, they’d have resigned him instead of Charlie Batch.

Day to Dream

We of course don’t have “draft day” any more, its now “draft days.”

But you know what I mean.

There may be more pomp and circumstance surrounding the NFL draft than there should be. There is certainly too much pontification, and too many definitive day after pronouncements.

So be it.

The NFL draft is something special. It’s a day a that opens the door to hope for fans from every NFL team. It’s the day when some team is going to make a move that changes or cements its future for the next decade.

It’s a day when a select group of young men realize the dream that all of us had the first time we touched a Nerf Football in the back yard and called out some random snap count.

What a day indeed.

Enjoy it.

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Comparing Steelers Report Cards vs. the Ravens

Regular readers are familiar with Steel Curtain Rising’s Report Card series, inaugurated in 2009. The genesis of the Report Card was simple and similar to the genesis of much of the rest of the material on this site: Looking at the stuff that the pros do and thinking, “Hey, I can do this.”

An additional reason is that keeping post game summaries to a reasonable length often times means neglecting to recognize individual accomplishments or tendencies.

I thought it would be interesting compare Steel Curtain Rising’s grades to that of Gerry Dulac of the Post-Gazette and Bob Labriola of Steelers Digest.

The first thing the jumps out is that the only area of agreement is with regard to the secondary.

Beyond that there’s a lot of variation.

It is no surprise that Steel Curtain Rising stands out on the quarterback rating. Ben Roethlisberger won lavish praise for his play against the Ravens, and his ability to bring them back from behind is commendable.

But he had a really shaky first half and his turnover came back to haunt the Steelers badly. Those two factors as much as anything else put the Steelers “below the line.”

Both Labriola and Dulac seemed hesitant to give out a good grade to the offensive line, to that I can only say: The Steelers offensive line neutralized a defensive front that has terrorized the Steelers backfield of late, “What more did you want them to do?”

In reading Dulac and Labriola’s commentaries, its also clear that perhaps I rated the linebackers a little too highly – although I thought that the outstanding performances by James Harrison and Larry Foote needed recognition. Still, the linebackers do deserve to carry some blame for Flacco’s superhuman 3rd down performance.

Ditto on the Special Teams. In truth, Baltimore had more success with its return game then I had given them credit for, and the special teams grade could be lower.

Labriola, who works at the Steelers complex on the South Side, never grades the coaches (surprise, surprise) and Dulac was a little less demanding than I.

The only other minor surprise is Dulac’s low grades for the running backs and wide receivers, as he commented on the fact that they were not used more in the game. I agree completely that the Steelers would have done well to have run more, but that is the fault of the coaches, and not the players themselves.

Time permitting, Steel Curtain Rising will do more report card comparisons in the future.

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