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Wednesday, October 31, 2012

Newsy day on the South Side

It was a busy day at the Steelers practice facility on the South Side Wednesday. Here's a rundown of what was going on.

@ Safety Ryan Clark was cleared by doctors to return to practice Wednesday morning. Clark was on the practice field in the afternoon, the next step in coming back from a concussion suffered Sunday against Washington.

The final step for Clark will be to pass another test on Friday that will allow him to play this Sunday against the Giants.

@ A sure sign that Clark is fine? The Steelers released safety Damon Cromartie-Smith from the active roster to make room for nose tackle Alameda Ta'amu, who was activated from the reserve/suspended list.

As for Ta'amu, he had this to say about his arrest for DUI and a bevy of other charges three weeks ago on the South Side, “It was a big mistake, one of the biggest mistakes I have ever made in my life. It won’t happen again.”

@ Wide receiver Emmanuel Sanders said he has been summoned to the NFL offices on Saturday when the team travels to New York to talk about his injury two weeks ago in a win over Cincinnati.

Sanders grabbed his hamstring and went down while the Steelers were in a no-huddle late in the game, summoning team trainers onto to the field. One play later, he was back out there.

His quick recovery from what he called cramps has caused some to say he was faking the injury to give the Steelers and extra timeout. Trouble is, the Steelers had timeouts remaining at that point.

I don't know whether Sanders was faking an injury or not, but it will be awfully tough for the league office to prove otherwise. And why would Sanders fake an injury when the Steelers still had timeouts remaining?

@ Jonathan Dwyer didn't practice Wednesday but said he intends to go on Thursday.

When asked who the team's starting running back is, Dwyer simply replied "RAC," the team's nickname for Rashard Mendenhall.

With Mendenhall likely out again this week, expect Dwyer to get the start again in New York.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

"one of the biggest"? So, what other skeletons are in the running with 'bombed, trying to mow down police with SUV before ripping off shirt to hide, cuz you know, 350lb half naked Samoans are a dime a dozen in the Strip District, blend right in.'?

Looks like Fast Eddie coulda used your practice squad tea leaves before embarrassing himself for the umpteenth^2 time. And good point on Clark.

Don't know how you prove if Sanders had cramps or not. I dunno. After getting screwed earlier when the refs told them they couldn't call a TO prior to the 2pt conversion, maybe Roethlisberger thought they'd hose em again if they called one. Just used one on the play prior. There was a play in between, but that was the case earlier too.

Patrick said...

Dale, whats your assessment of the extent of Troy's injury?

I get the feeling this an Aaron Smith type situation and I don't see him playing until mid December.

What would you say there is a better chance of seeing first: snow on the ground or Troy on the field?

Anonymous said...

I thought Ben had gone down, then got back up, causing an injury timeout, and they needed someone to go down or Ben would have had to sit out the next play.

Dale Lolley said...

I didn't see Ben go down. They had timeouts left, so they could have used one.

As for Polamalu, I look for him to be back for the first Ravens game

Anonymous said...

thanks for the info, dale. good stuff.

this game is gonna be a great test in two areas. 1. - how will the o-line handle the giants' d-line. 2. - will the defense/secondary be able to sustain a high level of play for all 4 quarters?