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Tuesday, September 04, 2012

Tuesday news and notes

Pretty much everyone was left on the table as a possibility to play Sunday against the Broncos by head coach Mike Tomlin Tuesday, including running back Rashard Mendenhall.

I wouldn't expect Mendenhall to play - I'm still hearing they want to wait until after the bye week - but Mendenhall has looked good in practice coming off the ACL injury and is making the decision a tough one.

James Harrison, on the other hand, made it through practice Monday OK and looks as if he will play.

@ Tomlin said Keenan Lewis will be the starting CB, while Cortez Allen will be the third corner.

That's not exactly surprising. Allen has plenty of upside, but still needs some polish.

@ It's beginning to look like Mike Wallace will start over Emmanuel Sanders. That's a surprising move by Tomlin, who usually likes to send messages through his actions.

I'm sure the fact that Wallace spent all day Friday and Saturday with receivers coach Scottie Montgomery had something to do with the decision.

@ The Steelers, by the way, continue to try to bang out a new deal for Wallace.

This could go down to the wire. A couple of years ago, the Steelers had strong safety Troy Polamalu sign his new deal on the plane before takeoff for their regular season opener.

9 comments:

Tim said...

Cortez Allen does need polish, but he's still already more polished than Keenan Lewis. All he doesn't have is logged snaps.

I think he'll be starting by week 8, or possibly week 4.

KT said...

Losing Wallace will hurt the Steelers -- no matter how you slice it.

But connecting the dots, I find it hard to believe that they can make a deal.

Anonymous said...

KT - steelers still have the upper hand. They could just franchise him next year. I think they'll get a deal done

Anonymous said...

It's not like Haley's offense has no fly routes. Stick Wallace in the game, tell him to run really fast in a straight line or slightly diagonal line, and dare the other team to ignore it on account of his "lack of familiarity with the offense". It'll at the very least get the safeties out of the box. Surely we're familiar with Wallace as an effective decoy (see: games 8-16 last year).

Dale Lolley said...

Wallace will be doing more than just running fly patterns

Anonymous said...

Mendy was named the starter against the Donkeys according to ESPN. Mr.Lolley I have read your stuff the past 3-4 years. You are a needle pointing dead south sir. Whatever you used to do please find it again...You were once a joy to read. Big misses on Hampton Harrison Mendy Wallace...The big stories of the 2012 off season you were O for...A Pirates type of performance in August

Anonymous said...

I don't even need him to predict the future. I'd settle for him being accurate about stuff in the past visible to us all on television.

James said...

The haters above are anonymous... what a surprise.

Dale Lolley said...

"Mendy was named the starter against the Donkeys according to ESPN"

That would be news to him. In fact, show me where it says that on the ESPN site.