GO LIONS! Dave from up Nort…

You have strong feelings one way…I’m not saying you’re not allowed to. But continuing to preach about it won’t flip the script. Having an opinion doesn’t make you right, especially when the league and millions of people think otherwise.

You can be AFC all you want, but don;t expect others to. I’d back Arizona if they were playing any other team but the Steelers.

I am the first to admit Harrison, Wilfork, Seymour are all cheap shot artists. I do not condone it from my own team, and I don’t try and hide behind the fact that everyone is doing it, or it wasn’t flagged, or they were not fined. It trickles down from the adults to the children, and the next generation is worse. The league needs to put an end to it before the next one to be carted off the field is headed for the morgue.

The difference between you and me is that I have yet to hear anything from you that might accept any responsibility for the actions of your team. No objectivity, and as such, no reason to talk with you any further. For the record, I am AFC all the way. How many Steeler fans felt the same way toward the Pats?

Thread closed.

No mention of the guy that used his helmet to clearly ram and try to injure Ben after the play? No mention of Bart Scott, at the end of the game, using the crown of his helmet directly into Willie Parker’s grill? No flags or fines…should I start lighting up random blogs or messageboards until someone takes the bait and argues the point?

Everyone wants the opportunity to shit on a successful team and not look at anyone else in the league. That bullshit article espn ran about the steelers and hgh right before the afc championship? the guy used no facts and cleverly didn;t include the fact that every other team most likely has a similar scenario going on. But no, let’s shit on the Steelers because they’re successful and still playing.

You have no idea how annoying it is to root for a team that everyone tries to dig up dirt on. Keep preaching the same thing and making ridiculous bets based on your own opinion rather than letting the damn story die.

Or bring it up again. Like everyone else. Real original.

“using any part of a player’s helmet (including the top/crown and forehead/“hairline” parts) or facemask to butt, spear, or ram an opponent violently or unnecessarily; although such violent or unnecessary use of the helmet and facemask is impermissible against any opponent”

Clark SHOULD have been flagged. Period end of story. The rule is plain and simple, but the league is very selective in its enforcement. The league called Clark’s hit H2H, and yet also called it legal. If they have a rule against such hits, how can it be legal? Like I said, the problem is squarely on the shoulders of the league. They need to enforce their rules as written, or change them. Clark’s hit fit the very definition of the rule, clearly helmet to helmet, and clearly violent. No one seems to be arguing against those two points, and yet the league calls it legal despite that exact wording within their rules.

What do you want to bet that within the first two quarters of the Super Bowl one of the Cardinals, I am thinking either Warner or Fitzgerald is knocked out of the game ensuring another round of discussion on questionable hits by the Steelers?

All I keep hearing is non-Steelers fans moaning about something everytime a Steelers player does anything remotely controversial. Even though Clark was cleared, this same bullshit will persist. How about move on with your life?

THE LEAGUE ITSELF CLEARED CLARK. WHY IS EVERYONE ELSE SELF RIGHTEOUS ENOUGH TO STILL CHASTISE HIM? WHY DO FANS THINK THEY KNOW MORE THAN THE LEAGUE ITSELF? YOU CAN QUOTE THE RULES ALL YOU WANT, BUT THE LEAGUE KNOWS THEM AND MADE A DECISION BASED UPON THEM.

Answer me those questions and maybe we’ll talk.

Every team has there share of cheap shot artists, but some seem to be flagged and fined more often then others. Right or wrong, the Steelers seem to have more then their share of incidents of players being carted off in the big games.

The fault drops squarely on the league for failure to enforce their own rules. Helmet to helmet is against the rules plain and simple, and there is no distinction between intent. It is only the result of the action and the rules are clear. Clark should have been flagged.

Rule 12, Section 2, Article 8

***************

( g) using any part of a player’s helmet (including the top/crown and forehead/“hairline” parts) or facemask to butt, spear, or ram an opponent violently or unnecessarily; although such violent or unnecessary use of the helmet and facemask is impermissible against any opponent, game officials will give special attention in administering this rule to protecting those players who are in virtually defenseless postures (e.g., a player in the act of or just after throwing a pass, a receiver catching or attempting to catch a pass, a runner already in the
grasp of a tackler, a kickoff or punt returner attempting to field a kick in the air, or a player on the ground at the end of a play). All players in virtually defenseless postures are protected by the same prohibitions against use of the helmet and facemask that are described in the roughing-the-passer rules (see Article 11, subsection 3 below of this
Rule 12, Section 2);

Penalty: For unnecessary roughness: Loss of 15 yards. The player may be disqualified if the action is judged by the official(s) to be flagrant.

*************

This is a league wide problem, or should I say league wide excluding the Steelers. I can’t wait for the day the shoe is on the other foot, maybe then we will actually hear some objectivety from Steeler fans.

give me something other than a bitter writer (like some fact). let’s all take the word of some two-bit writer who’s trying to drive pageviews by piggybacking off this insane accusation.

Carson Palmer knows it, so does Tom Brady and Matt Hasselbeck. Now, Willis McGahee knows it too. The Pittsburgh Steelers are cheap shot artists, plain and simple. They have been since Bill Cowher became their head coach in 1992, and they remain so with Mike Tomlin at the helm.

It is intrinsic in the game plan devised by defensive coordinator Dick LeBeau to take every opportunity to hurt the opposition whenever possible. Latter day Steeler football is all about blindside hits and helmet first shots. They rely on the consistent ignorance of NFL officials and the blind eye of the league to get away with it.

Steeler fans and the national media who seem to genuflect at the mere mention of this organization should stop sidestepping the issue and embrace what their team is, a band of thugs, no more, no less.

The media is especially guilty. In the wake of Ryan Clark’s dirty hit on Baltimore running back Willis McGahee late in Sunday’s AFC title game, announcers Jim Nantz and Phil Simms immediately exonerated Clark calling the hit perfectly legal. Their replays showed that Clark’s hit was clearly helmet-to-helmet, but Steeler love had taken over the broadcast booth. Clearly, this legendary team could never administer a dirty hit. Please.

It’s no surprise that Simms let Clark off the hook. He has, in the past, cowered, or shall I say, Cowher-ed similarly. In the first half of the 2002 AFC title game between the Steelers and New England, Simms failed to take a stand when Steelers linebacker Jason Gildon rolled over onto Tom Brady’s legs nearly injuring the Pats’ QB.

Later in the half, when Lee Flowers delivered his infamous dirty hit to Brady’s leg knocking him out of the game, Simms was again mum.

In the second half of that game, New England’s Ty Law shoved Hines Ward while the two were out of bounds. Referee Ed Hochuli tagged Law for unnecessary roughness, but failed to call Ward for a blatant facemask.

CBS showed several replays of the call, and not once did Simms remark on the obvious facemask. But this is Steeler football, baby. Smile to the cameras. Hire a coach that sucks up to the media and loves to be on TV, and you can get away with anything.

Monday, on SIRIUS NFL Radio, Randy Cross and Solomon Wilcots also defended Clark’s hit on McGahee. Wilcots said that there was a little helmet to helmet contact, but stood up for the Steelers. Cross actually said that helmet to helmet hits on a runner do not exist, whatever that means. The pair then chuckled about Willis McGahee being “liquified.” Yeah guys, seeing a player carried off on a stretcher always tickles my funny bone. Later in the show, Cross and Wilcots seemed more concerned about the health and state of Clark than McGahee.

Pittsburgh’s recent history of cheap shots is the stuff of which championships are made. The Steelers’ only Super Bowl title since the Reagan administration was a direct result of perhaps the most fiendish hit in recent memory.

Flash back to the 2005 NFL Wild Card playoffs, Pittsburgh at Cincinnati. The Bengals had finally put together a great season led by quarterback Carson Palmer. They looked every bit the championship team until Pittsburgh’s Kimo von Oelhoffen delivered a vile hit damaging Palmer’s ACL, MCL and PCL. The cheap shot ended the Bengals title hopes and changed the balance of power in the AFC North for the rest of the decade.

Once again, the Steeler apologists immediately absolved von Oelhoffen of any wrongdoing. In true Steeler fashion, von Oelhoffen said he did not mean to hurt Palmer, the same way Ryan Clark sat on the Pittsburgh bench Sunday night seemingly remorseful about his hatchet job on McGahee. Sorry guys, in both cases, the damage had already been done. Palmer has never truly recovered from that hit, and has battled other injuries ever since.

The beloved Steelers of course went on to win the Super Bowl against Seattle in one of the worst officiated games in Super Bowl history. Most of the bad calls, of course, went in favor of Pittsburgh. First time Super Bowl referee Bill Leavy and his crew negatively affected the outcome of the game in embarrassing fashion.

They missed several offside calls against Pittsburgh, called a phantom hold on Seahawk Sean Locklear nullifying a big reception by Jerramy Stevens and called a bogus block below the waist on Seattle QB Matt Hasselbeck.

A called fumble by Hasselbeck was correctly overturned by replay, but a clear helmet first hit by Deshea Townsend on Hasselbeck with 6:20 left in the game went ignored. Another dirty Steeler hit, another non-call by officials, another bogus Steeler victory.

The Steelers are not only dirty, they are gutless. At least the Raiders of the 1970s accepted what they were. Jack Tatum, George Atkinson and the gang admitted that they were out to injure and maim. The Cowher-Tomlin Steelers seem to want it all. They want to be respected as a hard-hitting football team that does things the right way, yet on the field, their record of questionable actions speaks for itself.

The towel waving Steeler fools and the merry band of Black and Gold boosters in the media can try to cloak the cheap shots in fabled glory. Bill Cowher can sit at the CBS anchor desk flapping his chin about hard nosed football, and Mike Tomlin can feign concern for victims of his brand of football. Their words are meaningless. On February 1, the Pittsburgh Steelers may in fact be crowned the NFL’s champs. In truth, they are nothing more than a bunch of chumps.

Give me facts about how many thugs are in the nfl, or sports in general.

Give me facts that Ryan Clark tries to injure, even though he’s been exonerated BY THE F*CKING LEAGUE ITSELF on two occasions where assholes like you make blanket statements.

Give me facts about so many ex-footballers going to prison.

You stand on nothing but your measly opinion, which means absolutely nothing in the grand scheme. You say Ryan Clark tries to injure then immediately align it with the thugs in the league. I give you facts that Clark has been exonerated and he’s a model citizen and NFL player.

But thanks for the childish nickname. That really proves your point.