There is a ginormous problem happening in the heart of Pittsburgh right now, and it is affecting the community in a huge way; every sports team stinks and is not winning any games, except for the Steelers. This problem continues to grow and is giving yinzers and Pittsburgh sports analysts alike some bad days.
So, now you may be thinking, so what is the deal with the Pens and Bucs? Well I think I have a theory. It is one of the biggest excuses that athletes like to use, but it may be true this time. I believe it is all the coaches fault.
Let’s start with the Bucs, after finishing 76-86, the team was 13 wins shy from a playoff spot. While the losing record is not shocking, keeping the guy who has held one his whole time with the team is.
Derek Shelton has been their manager for the past five seasons and has had a whopping 294 wins in 708 games . This is the 9th worst record ever for a manager in his 5th season.
After the 2024 campaign people thought that his job may be in jeopardy, but the Pirates General Manager, Ben Charington said, “ I believe that he is the right person to manage this team in 2025.”
How can you possibly believe that after he has literally never had a winning record and the whole city of Pittsburgh coming for his head? I just do not understand, I watch these games and I feel I can manage a team better than this buffoon on MLB The Show.
Enough about Shelton. Before I completely crash out, another one of the 300,000 complaints about the Pirates I have is the way they treat their players.
Why the heck would you designate First Baseman Rowdy Tellez for assignment a week before the season ends and four at bats away from earning an extra 200K towards his contract; what this means is that they pretty much cut him from the team before he could earn more money at the end of the season.
You may be thinking like, “oh well I mean honest mistake maybe they didn’t know or something,” but then like a week later they did basically the same thing to Isiah Kiner-Falefa.
Apparently they “forgot” to put him in, and asked him if he wanted to go in the lineup and he said no. Still, how the heck do you accidentally forget to put two players in the lineup that are so close to reaching their bonuses and then you pretty much slap them across the face and say nope?
Because of these scumbag moves, the Pirates are unlikely to get anybody worth signing in free agency. That’s if they even spend any money at all because of how badly they are treating their players.
Ok so that is enough about the Pirates. Let’s talk about the Steelers.
As I am writing this, The Steelers are 6-2 and are in 1st place in the AFC North. After a strong showing from Justin Fields in the first 6 weeks after Russell Wilson got an injury. They opted to go back to Wilson for week 7.
This turned out to be a great decision and Russ showed flashes of when he was on the Seahawks many years ago.
Now, I would rant but there is not much to be mad about. All of the games we lost have been close, the only complaint I have is about the offense sometimes. When the offense wants to be great, it is great. But, sometimes the offense is so terrible and looks like Matt Canada 2.0 that Chris Boswell has to score every single point, cough cough week 1.
The past couple of weeks though have been pretty good except for some parts, but other than that there is really not much to be mad at.
The defense is honestly the most exciting part of this team with a great line led by All-Pro TJ Watt, who recently had his 200th sack of his career, and team captain Cam Heyward. The backfield also looks great with safety Minkah Fitzpatrick and cornerback Joey Porter Jr leading the way.
Another cornerback Donte Jackson was a great pickup in the Diontae Johnson trade, who is 5th in the league in interceptions. Beanie Bishop also looks great for being an undrafted cornerback. This team could seriously make a run.
The only problem that is in the way of the Steelers making the playoffs is their sched
ule. They have not played a single AFC North team yet and it is arguably the best division in the NFL every single year.
They have to play the Browns 2x, Bengals 2x, Ravens 2x, Eagles, Chiefs, and Commanders. Every single one of those teams except the Browns and Commanders have been competing for the Super Bowl ever year for the past 3 years. It is always a tough game when we play Cleveland too because of how they are less than 3 hours away and a division rival.
We have arguably the toughest schedule in the league, but if there is any team that could come out of these with all wins it is the Steelers. But, if there was any team that could lose the rest of the games this year, it would also be the Steelers.
That’s enough positive for today, let’s move on to the Pens.
Although we haven’t seen much, it looks like the 2022 season part 3, aka an absolute crap show. Malkin and Crosby look amazing but the rest of the team is just not there. Jarry might be the worst goalie in the league, and we have barely any young prospects which is not good.
I love Rutger Mcgroarty as much as the next guy but I am just getting a weird vibe from him. The guy asked for a trade from the Winnipeg Jets to get on an NHL roster and not go back to college, then literally got sent down to the minors like a day after his debut.
I really hope I am wrong though, because I want the Penguins to be good again.
Now about the coaches, they flat out suck. I was a huge Mike Sullivan fan like three years ago, but he has just fizzled his way out. He refuses to play young guys and tries to play fast with guys who move like snails.
It is just not working and something needs to change soon in order for the Penguins to revive their future in the NHL.
As I stated, the season just got underway so it is tough to tell some things yet. One thing that definitely needs to happen is just changing it up somewhat and bringing in new ideas because the old ones are just not working anymore.
So pretty much everything is going wrong in my world right now so I guess I will just watch Penn State probably get steamrolled by Ohio State this week, and then be really sad.
