IX- I hope the members of BTSC can possibly leave our politics aside for a day and just read the article by the Post Gazette about DeShea Townsends unique partnership with doctor Zane Gates who opened up a clinic in his home town of Altoona. The clinic serves the working poor who don't qualify for government medical assistance, but cannot afford proper health care coverage. The operation runs on a meager budget and actually helps cut costs at the local emergency rooms, by keeping out those that would normally be forced to turn to the emergency room for simple care. Interesting stuff, and another way that the Steelers players are showing that many of them have much to offer to the community outside of the gridiron.
X-Going into this weekend I hadn't watched any of the 30 for 30 series that ESPN has been hyping. I'm not actually sure why I hadn't as I certainly had a modest interest in the series that chronicles some of the most interesting sports stories of the past 30 years since ESPN first stepped into America's living rooms. I DVR'ed the episode,"Run Ricky Run", about Dolphins running back Ricky Williams. Sheepishly I have always thought he was no more than a knuckle-head punk who couldn't stay off the weed long enough to realize his potential. Seeing and hearing Ricky speak I realized how off base I was, and that I frankly have never once heard his side of his life story. The episode was captivating and very, very enlightening on Williams as a person and athlete. Having said that Ricky has many flaws and is certainly not innocent in his inability to stay clean, but looking at Williams numbers especially if he plays another two solid season we could be witnessnig one of the strangest journeys ever taken by a player to Canton, Ohio.
XIII-The guys over at Music City Miracles are profiling each of the Tennessee Titans opponents next season including our Pittsburgh Steelers. It's a home game for the Titans and last season the Steelers eaked out a win with a god-like first half performance from Troy Polamalu and a decent game out of Big Ben. Hopefully Dixon, Batch, Leftwitch or whomever can keep the Steelers up and running for the game. The guys over at Music City Miracles are predicting a low scoring affair, with the Titans coming out on Top, 13-10.
XIV-The Ben Roethlisberger debacle is likely to continue for quite a few more months if not years until at some point people stop caring. The Huffington Post just took some time to talk about Nike's continued support to Big Ben, which quite frankly I found surprising considering he is far from an important cog in their marketing machine with or without the rape allegations. Nike has a foundation called "The Girl Effect", and the Huffington Post believe that Ben and Nike should team up to help donate funds to the program. From a public relations standpoint, I think Ben should be donating as much money to causes, signing as many autographs as possible and actually stepping up and paying his tabs at dinner.
XL-Bill Hillgrove will probably never be remembered as fondly as his long-time broadcast partner, Myron Cope, but he has been a staple for Steelers fans for many years when listening to the Steelers radio broadcasts. Hillgrove was actually inducted into a hall-of-fame for his contributions, although not for his work with the Steelers. Hillgrove was rather honored for his work in the 1960's doing play by play for the Pittsburgh Ironmen. He was inducted into the Minor Pro Football Hall of Fame this weekend and in the Post-Gazette he has an interesting quote about some of the semi-pro players and the effort they went through to play football.
XLIII-Its been pretty darn slow the past few weeks every since the Big Ben news died down and the Steelers first OTA's wrapped up. Nice Pick Cowher has crafted a short and sweet analysis of what is going on not only this offseason but what we can expect in Steelers nation possibly for the 2011 season.