Happy Friday to all of yinz once again and welcome to the end of what has ultimately been a busy week for the Pittsburgh Steelers.
While this week was expected to be slow news-wise, the Thursday releases of long snapper Greg Warren and tight end Ladarius Green with failed physical designations has certainly given us all quite a bit to talk about. With the team’s annual OTA sessions set to start this coming Tuesday, I’m sure we’ll have plenty of other news and interviews to discuss throughout next week.
If you’re a fan of all Pittsburgh sports, you’re probably getting ready right now to watch game No. 4 of the NHL Eastern Conference Finals and likely hoping not to see a repeat of what took place in game No. 3 Wednesday night. Personally, I can’t wait to see how the Pittsburgh Penguins respond to their recent shellacking.
On a personal note, my father is now back at home and resting comfortably from his recent surgery. As it turned out, his spleen needed to be removed in addition to one of his kidneys as it also had a tumor on it. He’ll know very soon what kind of chemotherapy he’ll need when the biopsies are examined.
The weather in Las Vegas has been most-excellent this past week and while it is warming up quickly, there are some nice breezes in the early morning and late afternoon. Wifey and I have even started walking again for about an hour prior to night falling. It’s hard to believe it’s now been just over a year since we moved out here and I don’t regret doing so one bit.
Now on to this week’s Friday night five questions and I tried to come up with some exceptionally good ones for you this weekend to answer in the comments below and I hope several of you have the time to do just that.
Have a great rest of your weekend and thank you to all who visited the site this past week.
Peace and love, peace and love!
1 – Do you believe the Steelers knew there was a good chance Green wouldn’t make it to the start of OTAs ahead of the 2017 NFL Draft?
2 – With Green now out of the picture, name the tight ends who will ultimately be on the Steelers Week 1 53-man roster.
3 – Between tight end Jesse James and rookie wide receiver JuJu Smith-Schuster, which Steelers player do you believe will have more receptions during the 2017 regular season?
4 – The league’s owners are expected to approve a rule change that would shorten the length of overtime from 15 minutes to 10. Are you fine with that, or would you like to see them eventually look long and hard at adopting college football overtime rules instead?
5 – As things stand right now, there’s a good chance that the Steelers first five 2017 draft picks, along with sixth-round selection, long snapper Colin Holba, will all make the 53-man roster out of training camp. Of the two remaining draft picks, cornerback Brian Allen and outside linebacker Keion Adams, which one do you believe has the toughest path to the final 53-man roster?
Bonus: Would you start Marc-Andre Fleury or Matt Murray in goal Friday night for the Penguins playoff game against the Ottawa Senators?
Question 1 – There was a close vote between four players that Steelers Depot readers said they were excited to see play special teams during the preseason. Long snapper Colin Holba led with six votes. Cornerbacks Cameron Sutton and Brian Allen were just a vote shy of Holba while Keion Adams was just two behind the leader. Guessing that excitement in seeing how well Holba snaps the ball in the preseason has just increased given the news of Greg Warren’s release.
Question 2 – Thirteen different players were predicted to land on the practice squad. A surprisingly small number since everyone was giving three choices to make. At least one person traveled into fantasy land with Steve Johnson as one of their choices – don’t think he is eligible. Another struck out by choosing Akil Blount, who was just released by the Steelers. Keion Adams with sixteen followed by Demarcus Ayers were the most popular. It would be great if we could stash Ayers but some pundits believe he is destined for another team if he does not make the Steelers 53. Others that got interest are guard Ethan Cooper (8) and tight end Scott Orndoff (5) and Brian Allen (4).
Question 3 – We want more Joshua Dobbs. What areas do people want Steelers Depot to analyze the non-heir apparent to Ben Roethlisberger? Deep throws; throwing technique; game winning drives; progressions/check downs; interceptions; rushing/scrambling/mobility; & red zone success. So far, since last week there have been four Dobbs articles: Parts 4 & 5 of his 3rd down incompletions and Parts 1 & 2 of his touchdown passes. There have been at least 22 articles in Steelers Depot about Josh since April. There is still some juice to squeeze out of this stone. Dave Bryan is just readjusting his grip and will pour us some more Dobbs soon.
Question 4 – Almost everyone is expecting T.J. Watt to make his first quarterback sack early in the season. The latest prediction was the 4th game of the season against the Baltimore Ravens. The median response was game 1 against the Cleveland Browns! Would love to see the young man average a sack a game. We’ll see.
Question 5 – We are a cold calculating empirical lot when it comes to superstitions like the “Madden Curse.” By a very large margin – 91%, we stated that this curse is nothing but a myth. Of course, many wish it to be true when it comes to Tom Brady and the real question should be whether you ever want a Steeler to be on the cover.
