Originally Posted by 86WARD
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I'm not gonna be the guy who says Snell can't be as good as Bell... Plenty of guys enter the league without much fanfare and leave with a bust in Canton.
Probably because Snell can never match the glide of Redman. Still, it appears Snell refuses to go down on a tackle the way Redman did, so maybe that combination of Suddeness and Glide wasn't such a magic formula.
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The first time Snell 'Busses' over some 'Urlacher' he will become a fan favorite and get the love.
That tendency to not go down can also be a double- edged sword, as it was with Redman. Let's hope Snell doesn't have ball control problems.Probably because Snell can never match the glide of Redman. Still, it appears Snell refuses to go down on a tackle the way Redman did, so maybe that combination of Suddeness and Glide wasn't such a magic formula.
"You've heard people brag about 'being in the zone'. They don't know what the Hell being in the zone is about. I played in the NFL for 15 years and I was only in the zone that one time." - "Mean" Joe Greene on the 1974 playoff victory over Oakland
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FYI - this is ESPN Insiders scouting report on Snell:
League is turning around a bit. Defense light and fast. NE proved that at the end of the season last year. It's all cyclic
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We need to pay to see the entire article but finally the steelers could share the work with 3 RBs, which would be a good idea, if they are all good.
As Conner would be our number 1, but if I would be the steelers, Samuel would be on the field on the passing down and Snell would be on the field on the short yard situation.
Tomlin needs to keep the RBs fresh for the entire season.
Hopefully in addition to each guy have a "specialty" each can develop into a well rounded viable 3 down back - at least for stretches. One thing I HATE about backfields by committee is that it can tip your hand to the defense. Like Legarratte Blount didn't ever come in to games to catch passes or pass block. Just as James White aint in there to run the ball. I think you can catch defenses over-committing to a formation or alignment when your RB is a viable run and pass option. Hopefully, Snell can develop that part of his game.
One thing I read that cinched the pick for me from the Steelers POV was that Snell is apparently a pretty advanced and good pass protector. They demand that from their backs.
I hope this holds true during the season. If you give a competitive power back some touches, behind an O line with 3 pro bowl players...it can create a culture of physicality and bully mentality on offense. If you let Ben's caddy call plays that ignore the run game, then it creates a passive mindset of retreat blocking and taking what the defense gives you.
Lots of offseason talk, becomes irrelevant when the season starts.
I would be surprised if Ben is still the leader in pass attempts this year or close to that because of the loss of Antonio Brown and also because we have more than one RB that we can trust in their roster.
No reason to have a crazy number of pass attempts again unless our defense often has games like the game against the Chiefs or we are often in catch-up football, which is not a recipe for success.
What? Is this 1935?
Did the Chiefs, Pats, Colts, Saints, Eagles, Tampa Bay or insert other Pass Wacky Team Here just sit back and take what the defense gave them? From my foggy memory of the 2018 season games, almost all of those teams aggressively and relentlessly attacked defenses.
It is true that run blocking your opponents into oblivion can happen. It is also true that you can pass them into the abyss as well. Pass rushing is tiring. Chasing pass catchers across the field or down the sidelines is exhausting. Stressing your brain pre-snap to try and figure out what route combinations you need to line up and cover is taxing as all get out. It is, for me, about possessing the ball and being effective with those possessions. If you have multiple point scoring drives in a quarter or a half, you are going to gas and demoralize a defense whether you did it with the power-I or 5 wides.
I do not want to be a running team but to be more balanced is a good idea ..... around 675 pass attempts next year would be even more stupid because of the loss of Antonio Brown.
Also the pats were very balanced last season ....3rd in rushing attempts in the regular season, 5th in Rushings yards and in the playoffs, the pats had more than 150 rushing yards in each of their game.
It also helps to have an efficient quarterback who doesn't turn the ball over. The Steelers didn't have that last year.It is also true that you can pass them into the abyss as well.
The Colts, Chiefs, Pats, Saints, and Eagles didn't have a quarterback who lead the league in interceptions. It's true you can pass a team to oblivion, but your quarterback has to be on top of his game too. Ben's bad decisions and greasefire performances are becoming more frequent.
Have you ever put you hand in the dirt on a football field, either on the offensive line or the defensive line? At any level of football, as it really doesn't matter to me? I ask the question to try and understand your point of reference.
In my experience, getting run on is much more tiring and demoralizing for a front 7 defensively, than having to chase down QB in the pass rush. Defensively you can benefit from a poor throw, dropped pass, offensive holding call....whereas in the run game, you can offensively grind down a defense based upon primarily effort and technique. From an offensive stand point, you can enjoy the same success by moving the defense and dominating, but also see a dropped pass, poor throw, tipped ball or holding call derail your drive and the effort seems wasted.
I'm not advocating run heavy offense, but definitely committing to the run game more than there was last season. Lets look at some playoff performances for perspective:
-AFCCG...NE(Sony Michel-113 yds rushing on 23 carries, Burkhead 41 yds rushing on 12 carries) vs KC
-Super Bowl....NE( Sony Michel 129 yds rushing on 24 carries)
-NFC Semifina…..Rams(CJ Anderson 123 yds rushing on 23 carries, Todd Gurley 115 yds on 16 carries) vs DAL
- NFCCG...……….Rams (77 yds on 26 carries TEAM) vs. NO
- AFC Semifinal KC( 180 yds on 33 carries TEAM) vs. IND
So we see that teams like the Rams, Patriots, Chiefs all committed to the run game substantially in the playoffs and mostly with success. This was not the 1935 playoffs, but rather the 2019 playoffs.
In all of those games, I bet the team's offensive line would rather play a 5th quarter, more than the opposition defensive line (with the exception of NO, as they got robbed by the no call) because they likely had the mindset they can physically move the line of scrimmage on the ground. Having a physical run game isn't archaic or a bad thing, or 1935 strategy. Its good football and it worked in the 2019 playoffs.
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With a stable of Conner, Snell, and Samuels, I am an advocate of run first run often. Use JuJu and McDonald to keep the middle soft defensively and pound the holy hell out of the ball. Time of possession, less offensive snaps for the other team, become that team they have to put in a different game plan for. I doubt this is how the Steelers plan to play this season but it is how I would approach it. Until a team stops us.
The Pats seemed to do OK with commitment to the run game …..didn't they?
Too bad the Steelers don't have a good offensive line like the Patriots do.....oh, wait a second.
Never played. I'm fine with like 15-25 rushes a game. But too many have visions of 30+ attempts dancing in their heads.
I don't think you put a number on it, but IMO you have to commit to the run game and not abandon it before you get a chance to establish it or if its working.
Even the great Coach McVay and the Rams ran the ball 48 times against the Cowboys in a 30-22 playoff win. Again, that was in 2019.
If Ben leads once again the league in pass attempts without Antonio Brown, it's a horrible idea...I mean, the Pats lost some weapon in their offense last year and Gronk was not the same player but they are adjusted to running more often .. Can our OC, Tomlin and Ben do the same thing? ... I hope!
The pats have run 48 times vs 46 passes against the Chiefs on the road in the AFC title game ..... And if you just look at the steelers, in 2016 we had no weapon after Antonio Brown in our receivers, but we run more often with Bell and they were in the AFC title game.
You can win even when your offense is based on the run ... The important thing is that your passing game is not anemic.
Kevin Colbert: Each of our running backs will make the other ones better
Posted by Josh Alper on May 1, 2019
The Steelers have cycled through a number of running backs since Mike Tomlin became the head coach in 2007, but the identity of the back hasn’t done much to impact the way the team has used them.
While many other teams have employed committees to handle the backfield duties, the Steelers have subscribed to an approach that sees one back get the lion’s share of the carries. Willie Parker, Rashard Mendenhall and Le'Veon Bell have all had turns in that role and James Conner was in the same position last year, but things may be different in 2019.
to read rest of article:
https://profootballtalk.nbcsports.co...r-ones-better/
Quick look at the drive chart and I see a ton of 2nd half rushes. And by a super quick skim, At worst at 50/50 split run/pass in the first half. https://www.pro-football-reference.c...all_vis_drives I think it might be closer to 60/40, but I don't care to count that closely. So they drove taht attempts number up in the 2nd half when they were leading by as many as 16 points for much of the 3rd and 4th quarter.
These counting stats pulled all out of any context just don't do much to support either side. I can play too. https://www.pro-football-reference.c.../2018/gamelog/
Anytime they rush over 20 times, they win! I found the magic #! 20 or more rush attempts per game equals winning. So the first 20 plays should be all runs and the team will magically win the game, we've cracked the code!
It could be that they rushed all those times in wins because they had a lead and they didn't rush in the losses because they were trying to score more points. Weird. It is almost like passing is the most effective way to move the ball in the NFL. It is almost as if you need to run the ball effectively at specific points, but a run heavy offense isn't gonna get you far...like say the Tennessee Titans or the Washington Redskins or the NY Giants or the Jaguars...
Some of those low rushing attempt games are shockingly correlated with the period in time where Connor was breaking down and Samuels was far from ready to carry the load and Ridley was being Ridley. Again, shocking enough context matters. Drill down into the drive charts (Craic has an excellent posting somewhere regarding the Chargers game) and often it was not a philosophical decision to turn away from the run, it was forced by penalties and/or negative plays placing the team on the wrong side of the chains. Pretty darn hard to want to rush the ball on 2nd 15 or 3rd and 8.
Should they attempt to run the ball more in 2019? Probably. Maybe. I don't know. But seeking balance for the sake of balance is just not necessary. Achieving balance based on game flow, situation, and scenarios -- that is key. I don't care if they run it 10 times or 100 times. Just be effective and efficient when you do.
With defenses getting smaller and faster, I can see how power running can make a comeback
No that I can understand and support. If you want to run against a specific alignment or player grouping because you think you can beat up on it, great. BUt doing it just to do it...
The context is important but we must admit that the steelers were not commited to run the football last year.Teams like the Jags, Titans, Giants and Reskins, their problems were that they had no passing offense ... so of course you can not win when your offense have a anemic passing offense.But we had examples like the pats (48 run vs Chiefs in an overtime win) or like the Ravens with Lamarr Jackson or the seahawks who were a first run team and they had a lot of success.
The only time the steelers were committed to run the football a lot in the last few years were in the second half of the season in 2016 and they won 9 games in a row and they were in the AFC title game...I do not think they would have won 9 games in a row if they would not have been committed to run the football, especially since our weapon after Brown and Bell were awful.
And I do not think we're going to have much success this year if they're too pass happy without Antonio Brown .... they can be successful if they are committed to run the football and yes you can win that way in the NFL even today.
I can understand why we have not running the ball a lot last year since the steelers were thin at the RB position but in 2019, no excuse for not be commited to run the football.
What about when it is 2nd and 5? In the 4th quarter the score was 23-23 and the Steelers rush the ball on 1st and 10 for 5 yards, then pass-incomplete, pass-incomplete and kick away for Chargers to score another TD. That is how the game that was 23-23 went to 30-23 for the Chargers. If you have a 23-7 lead at half time and only rush the ball 17 total times a game....that is a recipe for a comeback.
That is part of the philosophical lousy playcalling that Fichtner had, which cost the Steelers one extra win (at least) and a trip to the postseason. Defend the "new NFL" offenses and new offensive geniuses if you want, but there is, was and never will be anything wrong with running the football behind an O line that consists of 3 pro bowl players. The Super Bowl champions this year proved that again.
I think the drafting of Benny Snell signifies a commitment to run the ball more this season. makes total sense as we lost AB and don't want Ben to lead the league in ints again...
I hope that Ben, Tomlin and Fichtner think the same thing.
Colbert Hints At RB By Committee Approach In 2019: ‘We Need To Have More Help For James And Jaylen’
By Dave Bryan
Posted on May 1, 2019
For at least the immediate future, it appears as though the Pittsburgh Steelers won’t run a single running back of theirs until his proverbial wheels fall off. In fact, judging by what Steelers general manager Kevin Colbert said earlier this week during an interview on 105 The X Radio, the Steelers might even use a running back by committee approach in 2019 consisting of James Conner, Jaylen Samuels and Benny Snell Jr., who was drafted by the team in the fourth-round on Saturday out of Kentucky.
“In Benny Snell’s case, he’s a good football player that knows how to play the game,” Colbert said during his recent radio interview. “He played it at a high level at one of the best conferences in college football and he was successful. So, hopefully he can bring some of that to us because we need to have more help for James and Jaylen.”
to read rest of article:
https://steelersdepot.com/2019/05/co...es-and-jaylen/
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