Monday Morning Sports Recap

Steelers:

Not the way to begin the season. When I saw we were playing the Ravens to start the season I wasn't happy because playing them is war and we kicked their asses three times last year so I knew they would be out for blood. Why didn't the Steelers know that? Hello? With all the mouthing off that Harrison and others did about the offense's play in the Super Bowl wouldn't you come out playing like a team that should have won the Super Bowl? I don't understand it. I think they need me in the locker room to give a get-off-your-new-big-dollar-contracts-asses-and-get-your-head-in-the-game. What happened was an old fashioned ass whipping. We got killed.

1. Before the players boarded the plane for Baltimore, while they were still in the airport, Troy Polamalu sighed a four year contract with the Steelers. He then tweeted, "I am happy to say that I will retire a Pittsburgh Steeler!" The Steelers' organization is known for not negotiating during the regular season so getting Polamalu's signature on the dotted line before they began was not only smart because of what he can do for the defense, but it stopped what would have become a distraction to the team. That being said I wish he would have made some 36.5 million dollar plays yesterday. He was beaten on almost every defensive play he was close to.

2. Tensions finally exploded at the end of the third quarter when Ike Taylor was flagged for a personal foul. While I don't dispute that call didn't that ref notice that all the other refs were busy with a pile of black, purple, and gold players. Ray Rice started that little battle while kneeing Polamalu in the head, and while Troy is mild mannered and low key he isn't going to take being kneed and then shoved to the ground by his neck. Everyone was rushing the field to get into that battle and it resulted in nothing.

3. I've never understood why Ben Roethlisberger is afraid of running. The man is 6'5 and weighs over 240 pounds. He gets hit on the line so why is he afraid of getting hit while running with the ball? He missed three opportunities yesterday to run with the ball. Most times when he runs the ball he slides right before he gets to the first down. Makes me crazy. Big Ben can hold this team together and he makes great plays, but if I had been Tomlin I would have taken him out and put in Charlie Batch for the fourth quarter. But again I say that every time Ben annoys me.


4. Seven turnovers. You won't win games with seven turnovers.

5. Thrilled that CBS used Toby Keith's Made in America as the background music when they showed a recap of the festivities and the game. Appropriate for the day.

6. For the most part I thought the refs called a good game considering the tensions and hatred between these two teams (the Ravens won't even say the Steelers name, they are referred to as "that other team from Pennsylvania). They caught holds, horse collaring, arm extensions, etc, and they didn't came out of it uninjured themselves.

7. With two minutes left I agreed with the announcers: Big Ben should have been out. Joe Flacco should have been out. No sense in getting hurt when you weren't going to change the outcome of the game.

Other:

1. Can't begin this without discussing the loss of Peyton Manning, not only for the Indianapolis Colts, but for the NFL. Sighting HIPAA laws, Manning refused to discuss whether he would play on opening day and continue his streak of starts in a game. While everyone speculated on it for days, I thought they were missing the bigger picture. My thought was would Manning ever play again? The Colts finally announced he would not play on opening day and that he was undergoing a second neck surgery. They placed him on injured reserve, which means he could play later in the season. I hope for all of our sakes he comes back because he is the epitome of what the NFL, players, and fans should be.

2. Only quarterback who had it as bad as Roethlisberger had to be Manning's replacement, Kerry Collins. I didn't understand that choice from the beginning since there are some decent veteran quarterbacks looking for work. Where did Collins, who was retired, come in? Odd to say the least and it showed.

3. As bad as my Steelers game was the first game of the season between the Super Bowl Champs, picked by all of Fox's Pregame gang to do it again this year, Green Bay Packers and the New Orleans Saints was the opposite. It was an offensive/defensive game with each team switching off on scoring for awhile. The end was classic, but I'll never understand who called that last play. Why Payton didn't throw is beyond me. The Packers had stopped them on the line before so why did they feel it wouldn't happen again? An odd call for sure.

4. I watched ESPN at the beginning of last week and listened to all the experts tell the listeners which teams were going to be the teams to watch this year. Cleveland? Lost. Atlanta? Lost. Texans? Yes, they won, but against a Manning-less team so I can't count that one. Only Detroit did what the experts said. I can't really comment on it since I didn't get to see it as the Bucs didn't sell out and so the game was blacked out in our area.

5. I watch Terry Bradshaw and company for my Pregame fix. One of the topics this week was Jay Cutler and how everyone reacted to his behavior during last season's playoff game. Bradshaw went first and said that the bottom line wasn't how he was preceived by people watching him on TV, but how he was preceived in the locker room, and the guys in the locker room respect him and consider him one of the toughest players. Strahan, Long, and Johnson agreed with him although Johnson said it wouldn't hurt him any to stand up a little straighter and to look up when he walked. Greatest line? Terry Bradshaw in his southern accent, "Just cuz you talk like this don't mean you're stupid. Then Cutler went out, played his game, and got the win.

6. Only got to see the tail end of my sweetie, Roger Federer at the U.S. Open. Jeez, could I have any more upsets in the sports world this weekend? He was up by two sets, lost the next two, and then had the lead in the 5th to win it all only to lose. Very upsetting. I'm not one of those people who believe he is finished. I believe he is human. You can't win all of the time. No one can. But I'm thinking that players need to do some mental work with themselves or a professional to keep their heads in the game and to deal with pressure.

7. And talking about pressure...Serena Williams, off for a year and now back, and in the finals of a grand slam, the only American in the U.S. Open, on the tenth anniversary of 9/11.

8.  And instead of being a hero like those who were ten years before, Serena couldn't find her groove in the first set, got mad and berated the chair umpire, and got her butt whipped by Australian Sam Stosur.  I like Serena.  I follow her on Twitter.  But when she gets mad it is never her fault.  Ever.  Yesterday she was an ugly American.  Yesterday I was embarrassed by her behavior.  She was courteous and gracious at the end.  She said most of the right things, but it wasn't the chair umpire who yelled out, "Come on" before Stosur hit her shot. 

9.  And since I'm still on that subject....not sure how I feel about Stosur eventually giving it back.  Granted she waited until she knew she had won the point and Serena didn't even attempt to run to the shot before she yelled out her, "Come on".  Part of me was understanding of her for wiggling that knife around in Serena's gut, but another part of me was disappointed that she felt it necessary.  Can't we just play nice in sports?  Guess not when big bucks are at stake.