Trouble in Pittsburgh
By STEVE KING
I have written it here any number of times and I really truly believe that the Browns need to worry only about … well, the Browns.
That’s the case for every team, and the great ones figure that out. Come on, do you actually think that Bill Belichick, head coach of the Super Bowl champion New England Patriots, is ever concerned with any team except his own? Of course not. He can’t control what’s going on with the Kansas City Chiefs, New Orleans Saints or Los Angeles Rams, the club they beat to win the Lombardi Trophy a little over two weeks ago. He can control what’s going on with only the Pats, so that – and they – are his focus.
To that end, I think new Browns head coach Freddie Kitchens understands that, as evidenced by his comment, “If you don’t bleed brown and orange, you don’t matter.”
At the same, though, especially since this is the offseason and there won’t be any meaningful games to prepare for, for about 6½ months, it’s hard to ignore what’s been going on in Pittsburgh. Since the middle of this past season, while things have gotten a whole lot better with the Browns, things have gotten a whole lot worse for the AFC North rival Steelers.
The Steelers stumbled badly down the stretch and missed the AFC playoffs – despite being one of the favorites to represent the conference in the Super Bowl.
Star running back Le’Veon Bell never did return to the Steelers last season, sitting out the whole year in a contract dispute, and is apparently getting ready to land elsewhere for 2019.
Antonio Brown, perhaps the best wide receiver in the game, dissed his teammates and coaches at the end of the year and, unless a meeting with Steelers owner and President Art Rooney II this week changes the situation, which, at least on the surface, seems unlikely, he’s played his last game with the club as well.
All this has reportedly put head coach Mike Tomlin squarely onto the hot seat.
So, then, the Steelers, who in the past have deftly avoided almost any kind of drama and dysfunction, now is up to their ears in both of them – and have been for a while.
What does all this mean for not just the Steelers, but also for the Browns, Baltimore Ravens and Cincinnati Bengals as well?
I’ll talk about it in my next post.
