Some Thoughts on the 2011 Steeler Free Agents

It’s that time of year again, the off season. This time of year means decisions need to be made on the free agents the team currently has and if they’d like to Franchise Tag or Transition tag any of them as well as who they’ll re sign and who they’ll let walk.  Traditionally the Steelers move rather slowly and deliberately when it comes to free agents. They do their due diligence and typically make the right decision.  This year don’t expect anything to happen any time soon with the impending lockout on the horizon. The Steelers aren’t a team to make any type of moves without knowing what the new collective bargaining agreement holds. There are many questions that will need to be answered before the team makes any moves, such as will there be the Franchise and Transition tags anymore or even a salary cap?  Without knowing those answers it’s hard to see the team making move. Up until March 4th, the day everyone expects the owners to lockout the players, the Steelers can use the two tags and sign their players. Don’t bet on it though. 

As we move forward let’s start out by telling you what the Franchise Tag and Transition Tags are.  The Franchise tag is a designation that a team can put on one player per year guaranteeing that player a one year contract and the average salary of the top 5 players at that position in the league. It’s typically used on the team’s best free agent whom they want more time to work on getting a longer term deal with but don’t want the player to be able to go out into free agency. 

The Transition tage is a tag a team can put on a player guaranteeing him the average of the top 10 salaries at that position across the league. However, a transition tag player is free to sign with another team. Should he sign with another team, the current team is then given 1 week to match the contract or let him walk. If the team lets the Transition player walk, they are given compensation from the new team who signed him.  It’s another way to protect yourself from just outright losing a good player without getting at least something in return.

This off season we see one player we would definitely recommend the Franchise tag for and probably one we would recommend the transition tag as well. So, with out further delay, here are the teams’ free agents based on how we rank them and our opinion on each of them:

1.  Lamarr Woodley, LB- He is a must sign! Use the Franchise tag on him and keep him at least one more year while you negotiate.  He’s a top LB in the league and he deserves to be paid as such. With Farrior and Harrison aging amongst that group, it is a necessity to keep him.

2. Ike Taylor, CB-Another must sign. Use the transition tag if necessary. He’s the best CB the team has in what is a relatively weak secondary. He is a very good cover corner. No, he can’t intercept balls because he has hands of stone, but, he rarely gets beat for deep passes and he’s shut down some top wide receivers. Must keep.

3.  Willie Colon, OL-Sign him.  He was out all year and the O line was weak without him. He’s a pretty good O lineman and coming off an injury you can probably get him cheap. He’s a starter and the team needs to upgrade, which he would be.  Keep him.

4. Trai Essex, OL-Sign him. He is a decent O lineman as well. He’s someone who provides depth and we think he should also be starting next year.

5. Chris Hoke, DT-We’d like to see him back. It’s not the end of the world if he leaves, but he provides good depth behind Hampton and he’s been able to start when Big Snack has missed time. We’d like to see him back.

6. Mewelde Moore, RB-If they bring him back, great, if not, no sleep lost. He’s a good veteran RB and has provided some good runs and is a good pass catching back on third down. However, with Jonathan Dwyer coming into his second season in 2011, Moore may be out of luck.

7.  Daniel Sepulveda, P-Sign him. He’s a really good punter. Sure he got hurt two of the past three years but when he’s healthy he can really boot it. He’s also not afraid to make a tackle, unfortunately that’s something that is important when you’re talking steeler special teams.

8. Matt Spaeth, TE-We’d like to see him back. He’s a good second tight end. He can block and catch and he’s another big target for Roethlisberger in the goal line situation. If he leaves, it’s ok, but it would be nice to have him back.

9.  Dennis Dixon, QB-We’d like to see him back. He didn’t do what we thought he would as a starter this year while Ben was out, but, he’s servicable in a pinch and he’s the youngest backup QB they have.  Worth another couple of years.

10.  Tony Hills, LB-Either way, sign him or let him walk, no big deal here.

11.  Andre Frazier, LB-See Tony Hills.

12.  Jeremy Kapinos, P-If they sign Sepulveda then he needs to go. If not, then we say bring him back, he did ok when he came in.

13.  Keyaron Fox, LB-Let him go! He was the special teams captain this year and on special teams in the SUPER BOWL he commits the personal foul heard round the world to set up the Steelers last drive. See ya!

14.  William Gay, CB-Don’t let the door hit you in the ass on the way out! He sucks, he’s terrible, horrible, can’t cover anyone and is a piece of garbage corner. Let him go immediately. He should have been released last year, thank the good lord you can get rid of him now!

Steel Nation Association Event At Courthouse Tavern 2/10

Join us from 4-7pm at the Courthouse Tavern in downtown Pittsburgh.  We’ll be selling discount memberships, giving away great prizes and having a good time! Courhouse Tavern offers great food and drink and they are located at 310 Forbes Avenue.  Steel Nation Association members get 10% off their bill so current members and future members come on out!  We’ll see you there!

Steelers Lose Super Bowl 31-25

We’re sitting here, about 20 hours after the loss heard round the world and we’re unsure which way this blog is going to go. It could be a complete bashing of all the mistakes the team made last night in the biggest game of the year. It could be a positive outlook on the great season the team had and how they overachieved this year or it could be a combination of both. Honestly, we aren’t sure. So, we’re just going to let the proverbial pen flow and see where it takes us. 

The boys came out completely flat. In big games, Big Ben is usually the man but he tossed two first half interceptions, one returned for a TD. They second one was a hell of a play by the Packers D but still an ill advised throw.  Despite those two picks, the Steelers still had a shot in the 4th quarter but Mendenhall pissed the game away with an untimely fumble.  That would pretty much prove to be the play of the game and the Steelers eventually lost 31-25, as you all know. The thing that gets us is how they came out flat, they made 6 costly penalties, specifically down 6 with 2 minutes to go when Keyron Fox absorbed a personal foul that brought the team back to their own 13.  Fox is the special teams captain and a play like that is completely unacceptable. The Steelers actually outplayed the Packers in just about every phase of the game…except the damn score and the mistake areas..turnovers!  The Steelers had more total yards, more rushing yards, less penalties (believe it or not), more first downs and had the ball longer than the Packers. How’d they lose? Oh, they turned it over 3 times, had bad play calls, gave up critical 3rd downs on defense and committed 3 turnovers while not gaining one. You’ll lose every time when you do that.  We have been saying all year long that one day these dumb personal fouls would catch up to them, we just hoped it wouldn’t be in a game of this magnitude. If it were up to us, Keyron Fox would be finding his own transportation home after that moronic foul at the end. We’d also tell William Gay to take the bus because he flat out sucks. How many weeks have we bitched about the awful play by Gay. He is so bad and he can’t cover anyone. Good news though, he’s a free agent this off season and you would HAVE to think that the Steelers front office would tell him to hit the pavement because he’s not welcome back.  Speaking of free agents, Ike Taylor and LaMar Woodley are two other free agents they have this off season. They MUST sign Woodley and it would  be a good idea to keep Taylor as well. Woodley is a top notch Linebacker and they need to pay him.  Taylor is the best corner they have in a weak secondary though we think he may be headed elswhere.  Only time will tell.  Bottom line, this team fell short of winning their 3rd super bowl in six years and now they may have to re load or at least re boot.

That all said, it was a pretty good year. They did accomplish a good bit considering the injuries they had to Smith, Keisel, Polamalu, Colon and Pouncey. They also had to overcome the susepnsion of Big Ben and the media distractions that went along with it.  They weren’t supposed to win 12 games, win the division, get a home game or go to the Super Bowl. They did all of that. They exceeded our expectations and then some but it hurts when you fall short, which they did.  They have a really young offense and some key players to build around on both sides of the ball including Ben, Wallace, Pouncey, Mendenhall, Woodley and Timmons. They will need to re load and they do have the front office to do it. So let’s be happy with what we go this year and look at it as a stepping stone forward rather than a step back.

Here we go Steelers, Here we go!