On Thursday afternoon, Michael Jackson passed away suddenly at the age of 50.  To say the King of Pop was a controversial figure in recent years is an understatement but nobody will argue the fact he is one of the most iconic people of the 20th century.  Whether you enjoyed his music or not, I doubt there’s anybody whose never heard of him or some of his songs.  Even though my musical tastes went in a different direction once I became a teenager and heard Nirvana for the first time, I am still a child of the 80′s so I’ll deeply miss one of the legendary figures from my youth.  Truth be told, there was once a time when I tried to glue sparkles to my batting glove so I could emulate Jacko.

Evidently I’m not the only one who will miss Michael Jackson.  Pittsburgh Steelers wide receiver and Super Bowl XLIII MVP Santonio Holmes posted the above video blog on his official website.

However, Santonio is going one step further.  He’s sponsoring  a contest asking people to submit a short video of themselves emulating the King of Pop.  His favorite will win two tickets to an upcoming Steeler game.  Considering Tone’s place on the team, I’d imagine his seats are pretty good.

So get out your batting gloves, Elmer’s glue, and buy a bag of sparklies.  You have until July 10th to submit your video to Santonio.   And don’t forget to bust out a moonwalk.  Actually, if you’ve never tried to moonwalk on a wooden floor in your socks then you owe it to yourself to try it just one time.  Just beat it.

It somehow escaped my attention that in the aftermath of the Steelers record sixth Super Bowl title, MVP Santonio Holmes was slapped with a fine for winning the game.

Well, not exactly.  The ever-watchful Gestapo back at NFL headquarters issued a fine to Holmes for his Lebron James style post-touchdown celebration.  I guess in the game according to Herr Goodell, a player who just caught the winning TD in the biggest game of his life is expected to jump to his feet and excitedly hand the ball to the referee.  Nice job, Roger.  The fabric of society would surely crumble if a player were allowed to show even the slightest bit of emotion after making a spectacular catch to clinch a championship for his team.

Goodell must have some secret deal with President Obama where he helps fund the bailout of millions of deadbeats who bought houses they can’t afford through fines levied against Steeler players.  I haven’t been keeping track but the Black and Gold have been docked approximately half a trillion dollars this year.   James Harrison lost a good $50,000 on a sack where he evidently failed to fluff a nice pillow for the QB before gently setting him down.   Hines Ward was fined $20,000 two consecutive weeks for blocking DBs playing football.  Neither of these plays drew a flag by the way.  Ironically, Hines wasn’t fined for breaking Bengals LB Keith Rivers jaw so I guess a hit is only illegal if it doesn’t cripple the other guy.

In other news, the gloves Holmes wore when he made that catch ended up selling for $70,000. Which means Santonio has contributed about eighty grand to charity this week…

Speaking of charity, I appeal to the kindness of you my fine readers.   Nice Pick Cowher has successfully won their first round match up in the Great Pittsburgh Sports Blog Tournament but now we face a major threat in the sweet 16.  We’re matched up against one of the most popular Pittsburgh Penguins blogs which is fine, I don’t mind the Pens, they aren’t a total embarassment to the city like the Pirates.   But do they deserve to advance?  The team isn’t even going to make the playoffs this year.  Meanwhile, the Steelers (and by extension, ME) have brought you fine ‘Burgers a Lombardi Trophy.  Shouldn’t we reward the teams that WIN?  Please take 30 seconds to click this link and vote for NPC in our second round bracket. If you do, I promise to never again make a Three Legged Man joke about Santonio…

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How would you like those pointed at you?

Evidently those tricky Washington Redskins use their cheerleaders for more than simple team spirit. It has been reported that the Redskins have their cheerleaders bend and stretch in the visitor’s tunnel prior to the start of each home game. Obviously they think the sight of scantily clad gals in compromising positions is enough to mentally throw their opponents off their game. Okay, it’d probably work on me.

I have to give Washington credit. No other team has thought to whore out their women like this. Sure, several use them as goodwill ambassadors within the community and several produce swimsuit or lingerie calendars but this is the first time I’ve heard of them being utilized as actual on-field weapons. I’d imagine the Philadelphia squad is also used as a distraction although they confine their work to the players’ hotel rooms and money usually changes hands afterwards.

STEELER DEFENSE vs. REDSKINS OFFENSE

First year head coach Jim Zorn has worked miracles with third year quarterback Jason Cambell. He’s adapted very well to the Seattle Seahawks style West Coast offense his coach brought with him. This is the offense that made a mediocre QB like Matt Hasselbeck into an All-Pro so it does have its advantages. The offense leans toward dinking and dunking and when it’s firing on all cylinders even the deep ball is working. So expect the typical WCO stuff, with zone run blocking, bootlegs, quick slants, etc.

Campbell has a big arm, pretty decent pocket presence, and is tough to bring down. Last year he struggled badly with his accuracy, particularly on short and intermediate passes and pretty much got by through throwing the ball to TE Chris Cooley or going deep. In fact, the Redskins didn’t have a wide receiver catch a touchdown until week 10. Fortunately, Campbell played in a West Coast offense in Auburn his final year and had a great season so people should’ve known he’d thrive in the new system. This year he’s the only full-time NFL starter to have not thrown a single interception.

Their playmaker on offense is Santana Moss. He still scares opposing D-Coordinators to death, but teams with somewhat disciplined Cover 2 packages can negate him. He has always had problems with staying healthy or he’d be talked about in the T.O. or Randy Moss category for sure. Old friend Antwaan Randle El is a mediocre threat at receiver and is best as the #3 guy who can return punts. I miss having him on the Steelers but they’re paying him #2/borderline #1 WR money for a guy not at that level. Both guys are threats on special teams which is worth noting as this week the Steelers are going with a good Polish boy by the name of Jared Retkofsky as their new long-snapper and allowing gimpy Mitch Berger to punt with a sore hammy. Hopefully these guys won’t factor in the outcome of the game.

The left side of the O-Line is extremely strong. I like to refer to Chris Samuels as the “Jay Bell of Left Tackles” as he’s not flashy nor does he have eye popping athleticism, but’s he’s just a great left tackle. Pete Kendall continues to be excellent and is a great technician. Randy Thomas is good if he’s healthy. He just doesn’t have that unbelievable athleticism, which prevents him from being the best guard in the business.

Last week, our run defense held strong against a very good ground team. Aaron Smith was his usual dominant run-stuffing self and the return of Fatboy Hampton helped clog up the middle. They’ll need another good game as the Redskins lean heavily on the run in the form of superstar RB Clinton Portis. One reason Campbell has managed to stay out of trouble this year is support on the ground. Remove that support and let’s see if the kid can carry the team all by himself.

Of course, the danger there is our secondary will be weaker than it has been all season. CB Bryant McFadden is still nursing his broken arm and S Ryan Clark is out indefinitely with a separated shoulder. The good news is Tyrone Carter will start in place of Clark, much to the chagrin of Anthony Smith. Somebody should tell Anthony that when it comes to starting for the Steelers, there are no guarantees. *cough*

STEELER OFFENSE vs. REDKSINS DEFENSE

In 2004 and 2005, the Skins blitzed an absurd amount of the time and it created a defense that reeked havoc on opposing offenses. Then in 2006 the Skins had to stop blitzing as the secondary was getting torched. In 2007, Gregg Williams went to an extremely conservative Cover 2 scheme with the safeties playing 20-25 yards away from the line of scrimmage. However, it worked out quite well as the Skins actually finished 14 spots higher in overall pass defense than in the previous year.

The Skins big problem on defense is their inability to sack the QB. They only had 19 sacks in 2006 and improved to 33 sacks in 2007. To that end, they made the trade to bring in Jason “Twinkle Toes” Taylor in order to provide even more firepower to an already stacked D-line. Unfortunately, spinning the babely Julianna Hough around and around must’ve taken too much out of ‘ol Jason because he’s battled injuries all season and is currently listed as doubtful for Monday.

That’s great news for the Steelers as without him, their pass rush goes from mediocre to almost non-existent. Pass protection, as we all know, is to the Steelers what Kryptonite is to Superman. With this match-up, there appears to be a good chance Ben Roethlisberger will have the time to give the field his usual thorough look-see before he decides to part with his precious football.

The Steelers expect Pothole Willie Parker to finally take the field after setbacks the past two weeks.  He’s practiced regularly this week and looks good to go.  The team seems to be hedging a bit on his return, likely due to the excellent work turned in by backup Mewelde Moore but the time has come for FWP to get back into the swing of things.

Also helping will be the return of WR Santonio Holmes. Holmes will be back in the starting lineup after being sat for a week over a bogus pot bust. What’s amazing to me, besides the hypocrisy of the situation, is that no other team sits their players over issues like that. The Jaguars started Matt Jones the same week he was inducted on COCAINE charges. Jerry Jones was happy to have Pacman take the field days after he beat up his babysitter. Damn those Rooneys and their morality.

Washington’s corners did pretty well against the #2 and #3 WRs, but finished 20th against #1 WRs last year. The starters are Fred Smoot and Shawn Springs. Springs should be fine, but he does have an injury history and is 34 years old. I’m not a big fan of Smoot and if they change the style of defense and have Smoot play further off the line of scrimmage it will be a disaster. Carlos Rogers is supposed to come back during the middle of the season after suffering a bad knee injury. Reed Doughty is serviceable, but they lose a lot of range with him in there in place of the late Sean Taylor. Laron Landry didn’t have the greatest pass defense statistics last year but he came along well as the season progressed and should be a keeper.

They say you can’t go home again. A cliché, sure, but that statement held true of the Washington Redskins under the return of legendary head coach Joe Gibbs.  After a quick playoff exit last year, Gibbs went back to cheating at Nascar.  It was thought that Gibb’s Defensive Coordinator Gregg Williams would be the replacement, but he had burned some bridges with the higher ups and went to Jacksonville to take over the same position. The reality is that owner Danny Snyder wanted former Giants head coach Jim Fassel but Skins fans were outraged by the pick. The Skins then looked towards Steve Mariucci, who was also widely rejected by the fans. With no other options and Bill Cowher not interested in working for a tool, they wound up taking the man they hired as the offensive coordinator, Jim Zorn, gave him the “young brilliant assistant coach” line and made him the head coach.

On Monday night, I guess we’ll see how brilliant he actually is. Oh, and a few shots of the cheerleaders would be nice too.

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Her name is Kate Mara.

This Sunday, her loyalties will be divided like those of nobody else. Kate, you see, is the perfect fusion of two of football’s greatest families. Her father, Chris, is the son of legendary New York Giants owner Wellington Mara. Her mother, Kathleen, is the daughter of Tim Rooney, one of Pittsburgh Steelers founder Art’s boys.

Kate is an actress. She’s probably best known for playing a nutjob analyst on the greatest show in the history of television “24.” The reason I chose that picture of her is besides the fact she’s hot (duh), it perfectly sums up her mixed heritage. You have the pretty, stick-thin actress aspect which represents her New York side and she’s toting a big-ass shotgun which has Pittsburgh written all over it.

I know this doesn’t have much to do with football but would you rather read the 528th article about the Class of 2004 QB Draft or gawk at Kate? Anyway, on to my preview of this week’s tilt between the New York Football Giants and our Pittsburgh Steelers.

STEELER DEFENSE vs. GIANTS OFFENSE

They changed the offense under coordinator (and Steeler castoff) Kevin Gilbride by getting rid of so many deep pass patterns and utilizing more short patterns and come back routes. These safer throws help cover QB Eli Manning’s greatest weakness, his accuracy, which is key to his sudden emergence as an elite quarterback.

Nevertheless, the strength of this offense is the running game. Brandon Jacobs is far better than given credit for since he averaged 5.0 yards a carry and is very unfun to tackle because of his size. He’s not Reggie Bush by any stretch, but he’s far more elusive than say Christian Okoye was. Derrick Ward was supposed to be featured on passing downs and as a change-of-pace back but his explosive ability has many saying he should be given equal chance to carry the ball. This two-headed monster is complimented by a third excellent back in Ahmed Bradshaw.  They will be coming at the Steelers all day so Blitzburgh better be ready to clamp down on the run or the entire playbook opens up to the Giant offense.

Their O-Line deserves a lot of credit for their success running the ball as they have quality run blockers at four of the five positions. Rich Seubert is a severely underrated left tackle. Chris Snee is really good, although he does struggle with penalties. Plus he’s married to head coach Tom Coughlin’s daughter so he knows if he doesn’t play well, he’ll likely be sleeping on the couch when he gets home.

While run blocking is a strength, the line does have questions when it comes to protecting the quarterback. One of the key players last season was Kareem McKenzie. McKenzie has always been known as a run blocker over a pass protector. However, last season he put it all together in time for their stretch run. If McKenzie had struggled in pass protection like he had in previous years, it would’ve been nearly impossible for their offense to do anything with two offensive tackles needing help. David Diehl, the other weak link, is a good run blocker, but led the league in sacks allowed as he simply can’t keep up with good speed rushers.

The Black and Gold Wrecking Crew of LaMarr Woodley and James Harrison should get some pressure on Eli. This will be key as in their embarrassing loss to the hapless Browns they reverted back to their pre-Super Bowl form of Manning running around ragged, forcing things, and making bonehead mistakes.

Because he knocked off the hated Patriots, I’ll always be a fan of Eli. But realistically, he only played really well in week 17 last year, was about average against Tampa, and then only attempted 18 passes in the Dallas game. He was terrific against the Packers but if you watch the Super Bowl, he started making those bad decisions again and was just incredibly lucky. His highest season QB rating is only a 77.

Manning’s big weapon in the passing game is another old friend, Plaxico Burress. If you remember all the reasons we weren’t sorry to see him go they still apply here. Yes, he came up really big in the playoffs last year but considering how many big games for the Steelers where he pulled a disappearing act, it’s almost too little too late. He’s Eli’s favorite target and with his size, he should give our smallish corners fits. CB Bryant McFadden has a broken forearm and will be out several weeks so the nickel corner will now be the unfortunately named William Gay.

STEELER OFFENSE vs. GIANTS DEFENSE

The G-Men run a 4-3 scheme that is based on the scheme that the Eagles use as D-Coordinator Steve Spagnuolo was a longtime assistant under Jim Johnson. This means lots of blitzing, stunting, and changes in coverage. This also means we’re facing nearly an exact copy of the defense which sacked QB Ben Roethlisberger approximately 37 times in our only loss of the season.

Except the Giants D has more talent. They held opponents to an 83.4 QB rating last year. They were solid against the run (3.8 yards allowed per carry) and led the league in sacks. We’ll learn if our revamped offensive line has really improved since the Philly debacle or if it has simply been a result of playing sub-standard teams. LT Marvel Smith is still recovering from the back spasms he experienced three weeks ago so his return is uncertain. If he can’t go, the $7 Million Dollar Man Max Starks will actually have to earn his grossly inflated pay. He looked decent last week against Cincy but c’mon, it’s the Bungles. RG Darnell Stapleton continues to impress but he will be tested against the Giants excellent DTs.

Of course, I again refer to the Browns game where immobile statue Derek Anderson had all day and night to throw the ball. The Giants have suffered a lot of loss on defense, notably the retirement of Michael Strahan and the season-ending injury to every hooker’s nightmare Osi Umenyiora. Whether or not these losses have finally caught up to them or if that game was just a fluke will deteremine what happens on offense for Steelers.

Barring any last second incidents such as walking under a ladder or breaking a mirror, Pothole Willie Parker should finally return from his sprained knee. Mewelde Moore has been nothing short of spectacular in his place so I wouldn’t expect a heavy workload for FWP. In fact, I’m sure they’ll split the carries until he works himself back into game shape.

Loosening up the Giant D will likely fall to Big Ben and his receivers. One reason the Pats were such favorites last year was on paper the biggest weakness for NY is their corners. Sam Madison is a gamer. He was supposedly done 3 years ago and he doesn’t have nearly the quickness or athleticism he had back then but somehow manages to hold his own. Corey Webster was horrible last year but then played the game of his life against Randy Moss. Aaron Ross didn’t put up good pass defense stats either although he’s a great blitzer.

Hines Ward, Santonio Holmes, and the Tiffin Thunderbolt Nate Washington should be able to work against this secondary. The Browns passing game had little problem and even pathetic Cincy kept their game competitive because they could throw on them. As long as our line keeps Ben upright, there will be plays to be made. That’s one big “if” though.

Both teams are currently 5-1.  Both teams also have yet to play any real stiff competition.  This week will be a huge gauge of exactly how good they truly are.

San Diego Charger fans think they got the shaft?

Last season, Steeler Nation wept as a glorious season came to an abrupt and premature end at the hands of the Jacksonville Jaguars.  The subsequent week, the Jagoffs embarrassed themselves against the New England Spycams Patriots.   This wasn’t really surprising since Jacksonville only managed to beat a badly banged-up Steeler team through the help of some of the most atrocious refereeing in playoff history.   The league’s Director of Officials even apologized afterwards, acknowledging the Jaguars horrific cheating led to their undeserving victory.  This was little consolation to Pittsburgh fans that had to sit through an entire off-season wondering what might have been.

The Jaguars were rebuilt under Jack Del Rio with the idea of getting, tall, big players on the roster at most of their positions. Guys like Marcus Stroud (now with Buffalo) and John Henderson are 6’8” tall. Matt Jones is a 6’6” wide receiver and Marcedes Lewis is 6’7” tight end. They had another 6’6” wide receiver in Ernest Wilford (now with Miami) and drafted 6’4” wide receiver Reggie Williams with the 10th overall pick.  With all that beef, the Jaguars got themselves a big quarterback in 6’4” 250 pound Byron Leftwich.

While Leftwich’s arm was enticing, he just simply could not reach his potential because he didn’t have very good pocket presence and his long delivery threw off his anticipation, something that is paramount for a QB in the NFL.  Del Rio made the bold move to give up on Leftwich, a former 8th overall pick, and go with unproven David Garrard.  The move paid off in spades for the Jaguars as Garrard, who is a big QB in his own right, had a tremendous season and far better than anything that Leftwich provided the team.  Despite a terrible performance in the playoffs, the team felt going into the season that it’s only a WR and a pass rusher away from becoming a Super Bowl contender.

Unfortunately, this season has seen Jacksonville stumble out of the gate with a 2-2 record.  A combination of a mediocre receiving corp and D-coordinators learning how to game plan Garrard has led to new challenges on offense.  Plus, they still can’t manage to get by the Indianapolis Colts.

STEELER DEFENSE vs. JAGUARS OFFENSE

Jacksonville runs a West Coast offense, but a unique one in that they do like to go deep with the passing game and love to run the ball up the middle. In fact, the past two seasons they have ran the ball up the middle close to 69% of the time. The NFL average is 51% of the time. Most West Coast Offenses run up the middle only about 40% of the time.

The big part of their offense is their running backs, perhaps the best tandem in the league.  They’re almost the perfect compliment to each other with Fred Taylor being the every down back whose size and speed make him a ferocious guy to tackle while Maurice Jones-Drew is the smaller, speedier, big play back who can do it all, be it run the ball, returns, receiving, etc.

Obviously, this game will be no different than last year’s regular season debacle where both backs rushed for 100 yards EACH against the Steelers vaunted run defense.  Of course, that Steeler team was missing DE Aaron Smith, who is very clearly the main man along the defensive line.  We will be playing with backups at the other end and NT but the key to run stopping will still be Smith.  We did a good job of bottling up Ravens RB Willis Mcgahee last week but started to falter against his backup late in the game.  The Jags will keep coming at us with Fast Freddie and Pocket Hercules so expect a lot of run-blitzes and the like as stopping the running game will be the priority.  It’s not like we have to fear QB David Garrad beating us.

The biggest knock on Garrard has been his conservative nature.  They clearly tried to protect him and turn him into a “game manager” last year.  Not that being conservative is necessarily a bad thing but it doesn’t lead to a lot of passing touchdowns, although it also doesn’t lead to too many turnovers.  Still, he averaged a lousy 27 passing attempts a game last year and in the QB driven NFL, that isn’t going to cut it.  He only had 3 picks last season and already has 4 this year which is a sign both that they’re trying to open up the offense and that he’s not ready to be put into a position to win games with his arm.

To be fair, he doesn’t have much to work with as the receivers are not much to brag about, other than Mercedes Lewis, who shows some potential. Matt Jones hasn’t made the transition to WR very well. He seems fast, but not very quick and takes awhile to get going full speed.  The guy who has scary potential is Troy Williamson whose size and speed gets him great separation, but he doesn’t understand the nuances of the game and has horrible hands.  I’ve never been a Reggie Williams fan. He just lacks separation and is not great at catching passes in closed quarters.  Key off-season pick up Jerry Porter has always been overrated. Scouts love his size and speed. But the fact is he’s never had 1,000 receiving yards in a season.  Plus he has a history of injury problems and has already missed time this year crying about some boo-boos.

Between CBs Ike Taylor, Bryant McFadden, and returning Deshea Townshend we should be more than ready to control their passing game.  Unless the running game begins to gash us, I honestly don’t see Garrard passing for more than 100 yards against our smothering secondary and hostile linebackers.

STEELER OFFENSE vs. JAGUARS DEFENSE

The Jags play a standard 4-3 Cover 2 with the pass rush being almost exclusively generated by the D-Line with fast cover linebackers and rarely blitzing. They decided after the Patriots playoff embarrassment that they desperately needed to get more pressure on the QB if they were going to take the team to the next level, so they traded up to get DE Derrick Harvey out of Florida.  His presence should give DEs Paul Spicer and Reggie Hayward some rest so they can be more effective.  John Henderson is still a stud and Rob Meier is a high motor guy who gets to the QB pretty well. That being said, they did miss old Marcus Stroud as the team finished 28th in defending runs up the middle.

Of course, running is going to be a problem for the Steelers since they’re down to 3rd down back Mewelde Moore, practice squad fodder Gary Russell, and the Dumptruck Najeh Davenport in the backfield.  It would be nice to make this a low-scoring smash mouth type game but I honestly can’t see the Steelers trying to grind out drives with such a hideous selection of backs.  Plus, we’ve seen O-coordinator Bruce Arians is a pass-happy fool and this gives him a good excuse to chuck the ball 35 times.

Unfortunately, the Jags do have some quality starting corners. I like Rashean Mathis, even though his pass defense stats are not great, he’s got a habit of making picks. Brian Williams is very solid opposite of him. They had problems last year with the nickel corner as Aaron Glenn didn’t have anything left in the tank, so they brought in Drayton Florence to help them out.  Reggie Nelson had his growing pains, but showed some flashes of brilliance and has the potential to be an All Pro some day.

Without sounding like a broken record, the entire passing game will be predicated on keeping Ben Roethlisberger vertical long enough to go vertical.  Last week, they didn’t do as bad a job as it seemed.  A bunch of the offensive disarray seemed to be Ben holding on to the ball and running around looking for a big play long after he should’ve made the quick read and got rid of it.  I don’t think the Jags pass rusher is near as ferocious as Baltimore’s but I actually think their secondary might be a tad better.  How this will play out is anybody’s guess.  I would like to see the Steelers go back to the three-step-THROW offense they ran week one against Houston.  When they went no-huddle last week, the offense came alive and I think that’s because Ben doesn’t do hot reads unless they’re running an up-tempo offense.

Playing Jacksonville in October is fitting since they’ve been a House of Horrors for the Steelers as of late.  There was the horrific showing two years ago when Ben’s brains were still scrambled from the motorcycle accident and his body hadn’t recovered from spleen removal.  Last year, we got run over at home.  Then there was the screw job in the playoffs.  I have no idea what fate awaits us this week.  I just hope the game doesn’t end 6-3 due to a last second field goal when the ref calls a phantom pass intereference penalty on Troy Polamalu.