Jeff Reed, who got into a verbal confrontation with a fan while leaving the field Sunday night, may have finally worn out his welcome in Pittsburgh.
The Steelers will try out kickers on Tuesday in an attempt to find someone better, or, at the very least, light a fire under the struggling kicker.
There's no word on who the Steelers might bring in yet, but the best available guys would include Steven Hauschka, Piotr Czech, Shaun Suisham and Matt Stover.
25 comments:
if they're really gonna replace him they better hurry cause the bengals are looking for a kicker too. Nugent's out for the season
terrible season for kickers overall, him, gostwkoski and jason hanson all injured
Czech and Hauschka aren't any good. Stover is accurate, but is too weak-legged for kickoffs and long FGs. How good is Suisham?
"How good is Suisham?"
Not very. 79% for his career. No idea how is has fared on KO's.
Czech's never had a regular season attempt has he? You can forget him.
Hauschka, as mentioned, blows.
Stover probably wouldn't miss any 26 yarders(in 20 years he missed, like, 3 from under 30), but he probably can't be asked to kick anything over 40...like, literally. 41 yards may be too far.
Likely this is all just a ploy to try and motivate Reed. I don't expect it to work, since he's just as aware as we are of how much these guys suck/have a noodle leg.
He'll probably have a couple Irons on the way to practice tomorrow, beat up the paper towel dispenser in the locker room, then hit a 60 yarder on the open end of the stadium during walkthrus and all will be forgiven/forgotten so he can keep missing chip shots when it matters.
Bring in Vanderjagt...then at least the bars won't lose any business when Reed leaves town.
Reed deserves to lose his job, don't get me wrong, but wouldn't dumping him largely be making him a scapegoat?
The title of this post could just as easily read "Steelers tiring of Essex," "Steelers tiring of Randle El," or "Steelers tiring of Arians."
Essex, El and Arians never had the problems Reed has had, called out fans or got into arguments with them.
Vanderjagt actually isn't a bad idea considering the rest of the bunch.
Well, this is a start to correct our problems. Good thing we got Sepulvada to help with kick offs this year if we get an accurate but weak fg kicker.
Boy I wish our offense could click like the Eagles did last night.
Even if it only works like the first three possessions of the Eagles.
1) Throw a pass that ends up being an easy TD on the first play.
2) After the Redskins go 3-out (in a very Steeler like fashion - especially since IMO they had to answer that quick score by the Eagles), the Eagles go down and score right away.
3) Get an int and go right down the short field for the kill with another nice TD.
That was a nice toss to the RB (McCoy?) when a guy was coming un-blocked. Why can't our RB work like that?
Plus it was really nice seeing a o-line that just pushed back the defense. Vick felt no pressure at all.
The best thing of all? They never took their foot off the gas pedal and kept scoring.
Reed should know better than to interact with obnoxous, and likely drunken, hecklers.
That said, nothing else he said was wrong or even very controversial. The turf at Heinz Field is atrocious. Both of Reed's FGs were low, something I've never noticed with his kicks. It is likely that something moved during the kick, either his plant foot slipped or the ball moved.
If the offense could actually score TDs inside the 10 or 20 yard line, Reed's kicking would not even be an issue.
I agree about this rag tag collection of kickers being brought in. None are any good, but maybe Steeler fans need to remember what it's like to have a truly bad place kicker.
cut him asap imo
he's a total a-hole anyways
adamg I agree, but I just mean between the minor off the field stuff and now this thing with a fan, plus the fact hes missing FG's, its time for a wake up call. I doubt they release him though.
Part of me though, almost hopes they do to send a message to this team. But I'm tired of guys getting cut for that reason and then it comes back to bite them (Holmes)
Reed had never played a professional down when he was brought in to replace an injured and ineffective Todd Peterson. I hope they have a guy or 2 like that at this tryout, and not just the tired old retreads mentioned. I agree this is most likely a show, but who knows perhaps they'll unearth another gem?
Reed is the best option for the rest of this year, as annoying as he is.
adamg,
they replayed the chip shot reed missed and 3 things were clear as day.
1. the ball did not move.
2. his plant foot did not move.
3. his kicking foot contacted the ground before he kicked the ball.
basically, reed duffed it like you duff a chip shot in golf.
and i love reed's comment how he "almost totally missed the ball." as if he made some great play to even get the ball up close to the uprights.
own up to it, admit you're having an off year, admit you're disappointed and state you're focused on being your best the rest of the way. that's a winner's attitude in this situation. and that's not reed's attitude.
marc, I would say that if Reed's foot hit the ground before the ball, then it's probable his foot slipped. His first FG was low, too, and NE missed a PAT. That indicates to me a problem with the turf more than the kicker.
FWIW, Josh Miller has said on The Fan that of the kicks he's seen, neither the snap nor the hold have been the same on any. Presumably, as a former punter and holder, he has an eye for that detail.
More interesting are Reed's quotes in the Trib. They seem more complete and come off as much more benign than in the P-G story.
It makes me wonder if the P-G clipped the quotes to make a better story.
But, the bottom line is the NFL is a "what have you done for me lately" league and if you don't perform, you are going to be out of a job.
i hope this is"tryout" coming from tomlin because he sees reed has lost all confidence and at the moment, can't be trusted to make a 20 yarder. really hoping rooney didn't have to tell tomlin to try some kickers out.
i'd be surprised if we cut reed. he shouldn't be the only one to lose his starting job next week though.
without video evidence, i would agree with you. but it was absolutely clear he had a good snap, good hold, good plant and then scraped the ground with his kicking foot. hard to argue with the video.
the fact his first field goal was low does not indicate anything other than he almost blew that one too. let's remember these guys warm up on this field before the game and that reed hit a 53 yarder in pregame. so the turf can't be that bad.
and the fact the other kicker shanked his kick high and to the right has nothing to do with reed. graham did not slip, he hit it solid and missed badly.
I don't really care about the field, it was a 26 yarder. Maybe the mudball against Miami justifies missing that kick, but not much else. Hes got issues this year.
i think the chances of reed turning it around are higher than the chance that whoever they replace him with ends up being good. so keep reed. the off the field stuff gets blown out of proportion. who cares?
marc, again fwiw, Bouchette said over in his chat on the PG+ that Reed's comments about the field were correct.
Its not that he missed a kick in this last game. Its probably that he has been missing them all year which may have cost us at least 1 game. 15-22 is not good enough. Its probably that he is a total idiot off the field. Its probably that he is making excuses and sarcastically ripping the fans for booing him rather than owning up to missing the kick. Whats next, is he gonna go all Ray Finkle after he misses another one and blame Sepulveda for not having the laces out?
Cut Reed now and he will stay unemployed for all of 5 minutes becouse there are teams with worse kickers on there squad.
Would any of you like to see a kicker swap with New England? Becouse that was the best they could find when there starting kicker went down.
Chad
They just cut him. Wow!
he'll be a Bengal, count on it
and he'll prob kick a game winner against us at Heinz
don't let the paper towel dispenser hit your a** on the way out!
ha ha - i've been waiting to say that.
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