It's been a few weeks since we had a little Q&A with the SBN blog of the Pittsburgh Steelers upcoming opponent. Let's get back to it with a few questions from me for Arrowhead Pride, an immensely fast paced and popular blog. Considering just how sorry the Chiefs have been the past two years, it's remarkable just how vibrant and heavily populated a site Chris Thorman and his brother Joel (who I exchanged these questions with) have built. My questions to Joel's answers should be up on AP at some point soon. - Blitz - 

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BTSC: Matt Cassell hasn't quite played like a quarterback worthy of the big free agent contract he got this offseason. Tell us a bit about how he's played and what Chiefs fans think his potential is as the rest of the roster on offense improves moving forward.

Arrowhead Pride: Cassel's hasn't played the best season in '09 but I think to a degree that was expected.  There was no way he was going to match the numbers he put up in New England so I think that was an unrealistic expectation.  The fact that he hasn't imploded in a situation with so many things going against him is impressive. He's not putting up the numbers yet but when the rest of the offense catches up to him he should play well. 

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We've got some more Pittsburgh Steelers/Kansas City Chiefs content coming before their Sunday matchup at Arrowhead Field, but on to my weekly picks. Been doing so well I figured I'd continue on. 

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More photos » by Gene Puskar - AP

Big Ben and the Steelers were tripped up by the Bengals, but don't give up hope just yet. Plenty of football left to be played.

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This isn't really a state of the union type post, just several reasons why I feel pretty darn good about the Pittsburgh Steelers and their chances at at least returning to the AFC Championship game this year. Do I believe this year's team is as good as last year's? I think they can be. They're just not there yet. And of course, a rash of injuries in the next 6 weeks could derail the team's chances of even making the playoffs, let alone making a return trip to the Super Bowl. Assuming though that the Steelers don't lose multiple players of Harrison, Ward, Big Ben or Polamalu's caliber, I like their chances just fine of playing playoff football games in January. Here's six reasons, one for every Lombardi Trophy resting in the organization's trophy case.

1) The defense is rounding in to form and should continue to do so. The Steelers shot themselves in the foot at the end of last Sunday's loss against the Bengals - James Harrison's penalty immediately comes to mind; the inability to bring down Bernard Scott on first contact hurt too. We're not used to seeing the Steelers have opposing teams close out games against them with the running game. Cincinnati didn't exactly do that like we did to Denver the previous Monday, but they certainly increased their chances of holding on to the slim lead by gobbling up some clock and forcing the Steelers to score a TD to win rather than just get a FG to tie. 

Anyway, the defense still played very, very well for much of the game.  Now if the special teams wouldn't stop handing away points, and if the offense would just get back to executing in the red zone like they were to start the year. 

Here's the defense's number through 10 games (league rankings in parenthesis)

Points per game (team total): 17.4 (6th) 

Points per game (defense only): 12.7 (1st)

Yards per game: 277.4 (2nd)

Rushing Yards/G: 69.3 (1st)

Passing Yards/G: 208.1 (12th)

3rd Down %:  41 % (24th)

Sacks: 25 (t-4th)

Interceptions: 8 (t-16th)

Forced Fumbles: 8 (t-18th)

Fumbles Recovered: 5 (t-20th)

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I know I'm not alone on this one, but it dawned on me that the Pittsburgh Steelers never seem to play well when CBS sends its top commentating team of Jim Nantz and Phil Simms to call Pittsburgh's games.  So just for kicks, I went about checking the NFL TV Distribution Maps from the past three years to see just how well or poorly the Steelers have fared with Simms on the call during the Mike Tomlin era. It's not pretty (playoffs not included).

Week 3, 2009: Pittsburgh at Cincinnati - Loss

Week 11, 2009: Cincinnati at Pittsburgh - Loss

Week 10, 2008: Indianapolis at Pittsburgh - Loss 

Week 11, 2008: San Diego at Pittsburgh - Win

Week 15, 2008: Pittsburgh at Baltimore - Win

Week 16, 2008: Pittsburgh at Tennessee - Loss 

Week 10, 2007: Cleveland at Pittsburgh - Win

Week 1, 2007: Pittsburgh at New York Jets - Loss

Week 14, 2007: Pittsburgh at New England - Loss

Week 17, 2007: Pittsburgh at Baltimore - Loss

3-7! No good. Heck, they've only lost 13 games in the past three season.

Go away Mr. Simms! And Jim, stick to the Masters and March Madness and we'll have no issues. Capiche? Cool. 

More photos » by Keith Srakocic - AP

The two 'stars' of Sunday's game.

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On to our weekly red zone update post. Many thanks to Comcast for sponsoring BTSC and the other SBN football blogs this season. Their Red Zone Channel continues to received rave reviews so if you find yourself frustrated watching out of market games and are missing more football than you should each week, check out the channel and consider at least catching each and every play league wide inside the 20 yard line.  

On to the numbers.

Week 10 Red Zone Efficiency

4 trips, 4 FGs

2009 Cumulative Red Zone Efficiency:

31 Trips; 15 TDs; 13 FGs; 1 missed FG, 2 turnoves - 48.3 % TD efficiency (-7.3%)  90.3 % scoring efficiency (+1.4%)

The Steelers performance in the red zone was devastating on Sunday. Even one successful trip inside the Bengals 20 and Pittsburgh likely wins and captures first place atop the AFC North. Their struggles continued though and now Bruce Arians must go back to the drawing board and rethink his play-calling strategy in the area of the field where the windows are smaller to throw the ball. Ben's touchdown throw to Hines Ward against the Broncos was a thing of beauty, but even it required perfect execution to avoid being deflected by a Broncos defender. Not sure what the answer is but the Steelers better get it figured out sooner rather than later. Despite the issues though punching it in to the endzone, Steelers fans can at least feel good about Jeff Reed's kicking this past month and a half after his struggles earlier in the year.

More photos » by Gene J. Puskar - AP

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Happy Wednesday all. Sorry for my absence - been dealing with the same frustrating computer problems. Not good. I'm up and running though so let's get to some news and notes about the Pittsburgh Steelers as we loom closer to Sunday's important game with the lowly Kansas City Chiefs.

* First things first - the first action by Coach Tomlin to try to fix the team's special teams. Longtime reserve linebacker and special teams mainstay Arnold Harrison was released on Monday. Taking his place will be 2008 undrafted rookie linebacker Donovan Woods, who was brought up from the practice squad. Our own datruth4life was on this one following the Steelers defeat on Sunday. He mentioned that Woods willingness to go head hunting on special teams will hopefully rub off on Patrick Bailey - an undrafted free agent from last year as well that's not been nearly as good in year two as he was last season.

* The Kansas City Chiefs got a break out performance of sorts on Sunday from their second year speed merchant running back, Jamal Charles. The former Texas Longhorns star and collegiate sprint champion rushed for 100+ yards and 1 TD in KC's 16-10 victory over the Raiders. I thought that the Redskins would be better off without Clinton Portis for the time being; I think the same could be said of the Chiefs, who I think are now more explosive offensively with Charles than they were with Larry Johnson. Here's an article about Charles and how he will be a marked man by the Steelers defense on Sunday (scroll down to where it says BullsEye).

* Here's one more reason Jamal Charles will need to have a big game if the Chiefs hope to win at home against the defending champs: their top WR Dwayne Bowe has been suspended by the NFL for four games for testing positive for a performance enhancing substance. Arrowhead Pride, SBN's outstanding Chiefs blog, has the story. 

* Safety Troy Polamlau is officially listed as questionable for Suday's game. Hmmm. I suppose that's great news - for a moment there I was convinced he was going to be out for quite some time, potentially even the whole year. I guess not. Whew. Polamalu has a mild PCL strain. The good news is that this is not related to the MCL injury he  suffered earlier in the year. Thought he's listed as 'questionable', I sure hope he doesn't play this weekend and instead rests up for the following weekend when Pittsburgh travels to Baltimore. Frankly I don't think there's much of a chance he will play.

* I sure hope there aren't too many parallels between this season and the 2006 campaign, but remember the last time we played the Chiefs? We were in a much bigger hole than we are now, that's for sure. But the Steelers could stand to have a performance like the one they turned in that day three years ago.

* Football Outsiders has the Steelers ranked 31st in aggregate special teams play through 10 weeks. The worst of the four components? Obviously kick return coverage, where the Steelers rank dead last by quite a bit. 

* Dale Lolley notes that Mike Tomlin has said that Travis Kirschke and Carey Davis will both practice today. Both have missed the past two games with injuries.

* And finally, Jim Wexell notes that the defense played pretty darn well in defeat on Sunday. In fact, as his article states to begin: 

The last time the Steelers lost to a team that had fewer than 14 first downs, 218 total yards and didn’t score an offensive touchdown was in Oakland during the 2006 season

IX-Troy Polamalu could miss as much as three weeks after tweaking his knee early during Sunday's game.  The following article touches on a few other subject besides Troy's injury including some excellent criticism of Carson Palmer's statements after the game.  The article also sheds a light on how frustrated the Steelers defensive players are with the consistently poor play of the Special Teams unit.  Has anyone else noticed that the further along in Mike Tomlin's tenure the Steelers get the more consistent the verbiage and message from the players has become?  It seems clear to me that the players are starting to sound alike and are takeing on the attitude of their coach more and more.

X-You think losing to the Bengals and Bears is rough for a Steeler fan?  That's nothing compared to what Zack Heddinger, a Steeler fan, went through after the Steelers loss to the Bears on September 20th.  Heddinger was rushed to the hospital after he was poisoned by a Bears fan that his friends had gotten into an argument with earlier at a bar.  Heddinger claims the Bears fan offered him a drink as a peace offering and the drink had been poisoned with either anti-freeze or a toxic grain alcohol.  The victim has lost his vision and is living with Brain damage now, but hopes to return back to work eventually.  Note to Steelers fans;  do not argue with Bears fans at a bar.

XIII-Ed Bouchette ended his chat today with the statement below that left me laughing, especially given that the questions in Bouchette's chat were very similar to the gripes heard around BTSC and other Steelers blogs I've seen:

Thanks, all. I think you came out flat today, though. Either that or it was fatigue or the fact I gave you all the previous week off. Please, between now and next Tuesday, practice your questions.

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* The Indianpolis Colts and the New Orleans Saints keep their perfect records in tact. Both improved to 9-0 on Sunday. Neither win came easy. We all know what happened during the Colts-Patriots game. I prefer not to discuss it, but by all means debate Bill Belichick's decision to go for it on 4th and 3 from inside his own 30 yard line with ~2:00 remaining and the Pats up 6. I'll jump in the comments perhaps with my take. But I'd rather save my breathe and time for now leaving it at that. As for the Saints? Another unimpressive win. But a road win's a road win and sometimes the stars just seem to align nicely for sports clubs some years. This might be that kind of year for the Saints. 

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More photos » by Gene J. Puskar - AP

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Some more thoughts from me in the wake of the Pittsburgh Steelers 18-12 loss to the Cincinnati Bengals on Sunday. The loss snaps Pittsburgh's five game winning streak and drops their record to 6-3 with seven games remaining, three of which are divisional contests. With the win, the Bengals moved to 5-0 in the AFC North. They've swept Baltimore and Pittsburgh, and will likely complete the trifecta when they play Cleveland for the second time later this month. Pittsburgh is now two full games back of Cincinnati for the divisional lead by virtue of the Bengals owning the head-to-head tiebreaker. With 7 games still to play, that's hardly an insurmountable deficit to overcome. Heck, the San Diego Chargers have stormed back from three down in the AFC West in three short weeks. All is not lost. But let's be real - the Steelers are now huge underdogs to win the division for the third year in a row. 

Here are the Bengals remaining games:

@ Oakland, Cleveland, Detroit, @ Minnesota, @ San Diego, Kansas City, @ New York Jets 

There will be some turbulence for the Bengals, but not any time soon most likely. Cincinnati will be heavily favored in their next three games and absolutely should win them all. Then it gets a bit more tricky for Cincinnati. Minnesota won't be putting it in cruise control just yet when the two teams meet in Week 14. San Diego will also still be dealing with a thin margin of error. Both will be tough outs for Cincy. 

Here's Pittsburgh's remaining schedule in case you were curious.

@ Kansas City, @ Baltimore, Oakland, @ Cleveland, Green Bay, Baltimore, @ Miami

Anyway, enough perusing the schedule. Bottom line is the race for the AFC North ain't over yet, by any stretch of the imagination. That said, a Wild Card berth is also not a certainty. I'll get in to that more in my usual league-wide 'musings' post soon enough. 

A few more quick-hitting thoughts from Sunday's loss, as well as some stream of consciousness thoughts from me that I'd love to hear your take on. Not to let myself off the hook, but rather than spending several days mulling over how best to organize and present some of my thoughts, I've instead just gone with the 'verbal vomit' route instead and just thrown some things to consider out there. I wish I had more time (if you want to get involved, holler!) to do some of the data mining to confirm or refute some of my thoughts, but anyway, enough of that. We all have a voice and seat at the table and I'll take a turn speaking up with my observations about some of the more pressing and vexing aspects of the 2009 NFL season for the Steelers.

Grab a coffee or soda and have that Excel worksheet or something else handy to switch back to if need be. Plenty more after the jump...

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More photos » by Tom E. Puskar - AP

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Some preliminary thoughts from me about the Pittsburgh Steelers 18-12 loss to the Cincinnati Bengals on Sunday. If you didn't believe in the Bengals before this one - which I know many Steelers fans can't do based on irrelevant events in the past -  you should be by now. That's a very good defense first of all. They also have a bruising running game, a quarterback who doesn't turn the ball over much and money kicker. Nice formula for success. And just to remind you, the past means nothing. Rosters change, circumstances change. Heck, even individuals change. Chris Henry and Cedric Benson come to mind. Both have received effusive and consistent praise for the adjustments they've both made with their attitudes and work ethics. Anyway, the Bengals might not be better suited to make a deep run in the playoffs than the Steelers, but they match up well against Pittsburgh and are very much a legitimate ball club in all three phases of the game. Congrats to them and their long-suffering fans on the win. 

• That's 7 touchdowns this year allowed by the special teams or the offense. I've said it many times before - I miss Anthony Madison. One player doesn't make or break a unit, but I never understood why we wouldn't keep him when he was only on the books for roughly $1 million this year. Time for Coach Tomlin to 'get back in the lab' and try something else to fix the coverage units.  By the way, Jeff Reed was pathetic in his attempt to bring down or even just slow down Bernard Scott. 

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