The Pittsburgh Steelers travel out to the Show Me State this weekend to take a gander at the new look Kansas City Chiefs.  Unfortunately for long-suffering Chiefs fans, what they’ll see is more of the same losing football they’ve seen for more than a decade.  KC is a text book example of how not to run a franchise.  Unless you’re trying to run it into the ground.  The Chiefs have won exactly four of their past thirty four games and that trend doesn’t look like it’s about to reverse itself anytime soon.

Let’s start as we always do with the offensive side of the ball.  Their best weapon was TE Tony Gonzalez.  He was traded during the offseason because he wanted to play for a winner.  Then there is Larry Johnson.  Johnson put up incredible numbers for the Chiefs (on an incredible amount of carries) in two consecutive seasons.  He also displayed an O.J. Simpson-esque touch with the ladies as he was arrested on four separate occasions, all of them involving violence against women.  KC rewarded this misogynist with a 6 year $45 million contract.  Only after insulting his head coach on Twitter was he finally released a couple weeks back, eventually finding a new home with every criminal’s favorite hideout, the Bengals.

Although those players are gone, there are still plenty of mistakes on the team.  Following a season when he played exactly one month of decent football, the Chiefs traded for Patriots backup Matt Cassel.  Before taking a single snap, they rewarded Cassel with a 6 year $63 million deal.  Geniuses.  Of course, the only remotely decent WR he has to throw to is Dwayne Bowe. But Bowe will not play this Sunday because he’s sitting out a four game suspension for steroid use.  Todd Haley coached a high-powered Cardinals offense all the way to the Super Bowl last season but he’d have to be Miracle Max to improve on the 18 points per game average the team had last year.

For the Steelers, it appears to be all systems go on the offensive side of the ball.  Bruce Arians allegedly plans to rein in his Flying Circus in favor of a more balanced attack. I’ll believe that when I see it.  Still, a heavy dose of Rashard Mendenhall would be exactly what this team needs to get back on a winning track.  Especially since KC is ranked down near the bottom of the league in rush defense.

Which brings us to yet more bad news for the Chiefs.  Only 0-16 Detroit gave up more yardage last year as KC set a new record for futility by recording a total of only 10 sacks.  This year they’ve switched over to a 3-4 and used their first two draft picks on stud defensive prospects, Tyson Jackson and Alex Magee. They also took on more Patriots garbage by taking ancient LB (and former Steeler) Mike Vrabel in the Cassel trade and signing the equally ancient Zach Thomas away from the Cowboys. With no pass rush, the secondary got picked on last year and yet it’s probably the strength of this unit.

For the Steelers, there are injuries aplenty to worry about.  Troy Polamalu remains “questionable” but is definitely not playing Sunday.  Look, if we can’t beat the Chiefs without Troy, just forfeit the rest of the season because we’re done.  In other injury news, Travis Kirschke‘s sprained calf is now torn because Mike Tomlin is a filthy liar.  He did try some individual drills this week but evidently he’s still a few weeks away.  Shockingly, I’m okay with his absence because his backup (or the backup to the backup if you’re keeping score), Nick Eason, has done a fairly solid job.  Last year, the Steelers D sacked Cassel seven times as they dazed and confused him all afternoon. While he’s now a year more experienced, I still expect James Harrison and company to be after him like a school of sharks tasting blood in the water.

Although they say “Any Given Sunday” for a very legitimate reason, this weekend should be little more than a tune-up.  I expect a professional, tidy effort from the Steelers in taking care of business like good teams do when they play the dregs of the NFL.  Get in, get your win, and get out without anybody getting hurt.  Next week we have the first of two games against the Ratbirds which may very well decide our season.  No time like the present to start playing winning football.

Fans of the Pittsburgh Steelers are everywhere. Even in Dallas as the above video shows. I love how the newspaper gave the entire family Cowboys jerseys (including, ugh, pink ones) to make it look like they follow the team. The look on Jason Witten‘s face when he walks into the kid’s room is hilarious.

One of the other cool things about Steeler Nation is how we take over other team’s stadiums. This Sunday, for example, I expect there to be a sea of Black and Gold amongst smatterings of red when we play the Kansas City Chiefs. After all, the Chiefs are a truly wretched franchise mired in yet another losing season. Fans looking to travel, ex-Burghers still loyal to their hometown, and the few intelligent Missourians (an oxymoron, I know) who’ve long since given up on their franchise will likely conspire to make this a home game on the road.

I just hope those outside of the ‘Burgh are careful because being a Steelers fan could be dangerous to your health.

Making the rounds of the internet has been this story about a Pittsburgh man who was in Chicago for the game against the Bears. Afterward, he got into a bit of friendly smack talking with the Bears fans at a local bar. Supposedly, this back-and-forth eventually escalated into a rather heated exchange. I’ll take a wild guess and say alcohol was involved. However, when the locals decided to buy the Yinzer a beer to put the issue to bed, things quickly went from bad to worse.

See, these upstanding citizens decided to slip something into his drink. Roofies most likely.  I wonder how many of these men were in a fraternity at Penn State.  Anyway, this incident tells us two things about Chicago. One, their fans are a bunch of scumbags. And two, if you’re a single woman in the Windy City, you should probably join Match.com.

Anyway, our ‘Burgh guy had a bad reaction to this spiked drink. He passed out and was rushed to the hospital. While there, his heart stopped FOUR TIMES. He was eventually stabilized but has been left blind and suffering brain damage. Mind you, this all was a result of a football game the Bears WON.

So please, Steeler Nation, continue to invade enemy territory. Continue to take over opposing stadiums. Continue to wave your Terrible Towels wherever you may go. Just be careful. The world’s a big ugly scary place full of bitter fans of shitty football teams. And that’s just Cleveland.

Happy New Year!

Now that we’ve kissed 2008 goodbye, let’s take a look at what we have coming up in 2009. The proverbial Infinite Monkeys who dream up the NFL schedules have seen fit to release next year’s slate of victims for your Pittsburgh Steelers. Take a look:

Home: Baltimore Ravens, Cincinnati Bengals, Cleveland Browns, Oakland Raiders, San Diego Chargers, Tennessee Titans, Green Bay Packers, Minnesota Vikings

Away: Baltimore Ravens, Cincinnati Bengals, Cleveland Browns, Denver Broncos, Kansas City Chiefs, Miami Dolphins, Chicago Bears, Detroit Lions

A few thoughts leap to mind. First, I think we have a legit shot at going 16-0. I realize teams can improve or degrade one year to the next but on paper that’s a really easy schedule. Plus, let’s be realistic. Detroit, Kansas City, and Oakland need far more help than one good draft can provide. Speaking of the Lions, anybody want to bet that game ends up being their annual Thanksgiving showcase? Hopefully this time we won’t take them to overtime or if we do the ref knows how to run a coin toss.