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Kick and Punt Return teams remain laughable
By Dagger | October 27, 2008
The Steelers have brought in another Fullback as they look to add more speed to their return game
It seemed like only yesterday Mike Tomlin was conducting his first ever Steeler training camp and was stressing the importance of Special Teams. Remember those days? The Steelers training camp workload was increased by an inordinate amount as players were diving to block punts (volleyballs), working on the return game, and trying to improve an aspect of the team that had been a trouble spot for a few years. Well, the cover teams have stepped up and have played well this season but the Punt and Kick return teams continue to be a joke.
Mike Tomlin took over the head coaching duties last year and appointed Bob Ligashesky his Special Teams coach. Ligashesky had been working with the Rams for the previous 2 season before getting fired. In 2006 the Rams Specials Teams didn’t have one unit ranked above 25th overall (includes coverage and return teams). In his last Rams season before getting fired, the Ligashesky led special teams ranked 25th in Punt Returns, 26th in Kick Returns, 28th in Coverage teams. Last year with Pittsburgh our Special Teams were 21st in Kick Returns and 30th in Punt Returns. So far this season we are 30th in Kick Returns and 31st in Punt Returns.
Average starting field position and getting some offense from your return teams is extremely important when your offense is as unreliable as ours (Our running offense is ranked 18th in the NFL, our passing offense is ranked 24th in the NFL).
The Steelers continue to put a Fullback and a Powerback on the kickoff return team and I think they have returned a punt for positive yardage maybe 2 or 3 times all season. As long as the Steelers continue to ignore this part of our game, I will continue to question the coaching staff. Basically “declining” on PR and KR is idiotic. Some of the blame needs to go to the blocking units obviously, but even when a hole is there, or a seam is found, our return men aren’t fast or explosive enough to take advantage.
Want to see how important your average starting field position is in the NFL?
This week, teams that had the better average starting field position were: 11-1. Last week they were 10-3. Of course turnovers come into play here as well. So, over the past 2 weeks…if you beat the other team in average starting field position….you’re 21-4.
Topics: Steelers | 14 Comments »
October 27th, 2008 at 9:59 pm
WOW I had no idea that the special teams coach had that bad of a resume. How the hell does Tomlin pick him? Was he like “hey my special teams suck, can I have a job?” WTF Tomlin?
I am really worried. Tomlin has Arians as his OC, this bum as his ST coach. 2/3 of our coaching stinks.
The only good coordinator we have is Lebeau and Tomlin (I believe) WAS FORCED to retain him when he took the job, not that we know if he wanted to replace him anyways.
My point is that Tomlin chose two coordinators/coaches and they are both awful. This scares me about the future of the team. Lebau will have to retire in the next few season. Who comes then? Some reject from the vikings and that crappy defense?
October 27th, 2008 at 10:05 pm
Arians wasn’t his choice I believe. He was promoted from within the organization.
October 27th, 2008 at 10:37 pm
Arians wasn’t his choice, but he DID choose to keep LeBeau AND to run LeBeau’s offense as opposed to the 4-3 cover-2 systems he’s worked with his entire coaching career.
October 27th, 2008 at 10:37 pm
Tomlin kept LeBeau.
Tomlin promoted Arians from WR coach to OC. One of the reasons we just heard was that Tomlin liked Arians’ 3rd down package?? Weird.
Ligashesky and Zerlein were brought from the outside.
October 27th, 2008 at 10:38 pm
*Defense My bad.
October 27th, 2008 at 10:56 pm
He chose to retain him and keep him. Even last year our offensive playcalling was starting to show problems. Ben threw alot of TD’s but our offense was VERY boom or bust, now its just bust.
October 28th, 2008 at 10:06 am
I think it’s hard to say where in the Front Office (to include Tomlin) these decisions were made. I would guess that Tomlin was consulted, but there is NO WAY that Rooney/Colbert are going to let a (literally) rookie head coach make his own decisions across the board on his staff or personnel. No way. This was a team two seasons removed from winning the Super Bowl (and three from going 16-2), they weren’t about to allow the new coach to “ruin” that.
In terms of the offense, remember that this is BenRoth’s team and will be for the next decade if he survives. I would guess that Ben’s wishes in terms of who the OC was were at least solicited by the FO, if not followed. What is frustrating to me is that Arians is not exactly a legend, yet he was being counted on to cover Tomlin’s weaknesses.
As for the special teams
October 28th, 2008 at 10:08 am
As for the special teams – vomit. (Sorry!) Why not try to block every punt? Seriously, if there is no positive return, send ten guys ON EVERY PUNT. That way, you have one guy back to fair catch and you might get lucky. I was screaming at the TV for them to at least try to block the Giants’ punt from their own end zone. What did they have to lose?
October 28th, 2008 at 12:14 pm
i thought that Rock Cartright was slow on KO returns, but watching Davenport was truly laughable.. the worst KO returner in recent memory
October 28th, 2008 at 12:35 pm
Our special teams were terrible last year and the special teams coach kept his job. I reason that Arians will keep his job this year even though our offense is a joke. His schemes aren’t even fundamentally sound for chrissakes!
October 28th, 2008 at 5:44 pm
Really, it can’t be worse than watching Randle-El dance during a punt return for that massive 3 yard gain…
October 28th, 2008 at 6:44 pm
I’d give my right eye to have Randle El back right now. At least there is the threat of positive yardage.
Watch this Sunday…you’ll be laughing at our return teams.
October 28th, 2008 at 9:29 pm
Rock Cartwright may be slow for a return man, but his average of over 25 yards per kick return over the past two years is very very respectable. Najeh was never more than average, and he’s no longer a 4.5 guy like he was when he came out of college. And don’t even get me started about Carey Davis. Why does that guy even have a roster spot?
October 30th, 2008 at 12:09 pm
I think that our special teams have been REMARKABLY better this year than in years past, particularly in coverage. The ‘return’ aspect of the game has yet to produce any significant dividends, but I can live with that as long as we are not turning the ball over and not giving up big kick off or punt returns.