So I just got done today watching the Steelers versus the Raiders. The Steelers got the raw end of two calls in particular which I want to discuss. One was a hit by James Harrison where he leveled the Raiders’ QB a split second after he released the ball. It wasn’t a late hit but he went through him and to the ground. Out came the most idiotic flag for unnecessary roughness I have seen in a while. The ref called it because he claimed Harrison landed on the quarterback with all his weight. If it wasn’t a late hit what is wrong here?

Harrison’s hit was not only legal due to the timing but honestly, how else is he supposed to tackle a quarterback? Is he supposed to tap him gently and hope and pray that the QB goes down? People say that the league is targeting the Steelers after it got egg on its face over the Big Ben flap where no charges were filed and the league essentially banned a player for not breaking the law. Meanwhile Brett Favre was never suspended for his off the field antics with a female reporter. Instead they have decided to pick on James Harrison it seems? I guess it is just easier than dealing with other issues with other players that the league doesn’t want to deal with.

Earlier in the game however there was another bogus call. Ryan Clark tackled a receiver, landing a helmet square in the opposing player’s back. There was a flag and he was tagged for 15 yard for a “helmet to helmet” hit that never happened. Flash back a few weeks. Hines Ward was reaching for a ball in the end zone and the opposing player’s helmet clearly hit the back of his helmet. No call, and no fine that I am aware of for that one.

It seem to me the league has a big problem with helmet to helmet hits. That big problem is consistency in calling them. And often when they are called it seems that they are being called when a defensive player already in the act of tackling winds up making contact with the helmet of another player who is falling down and whose helmet crosses his helmet’s path.

In the NHL, high sticking is called when a player brings his stick up and clips an opposing player in the face. However, if the player is falling down and contacts a stick there is no penalty. To me it seems like the answer to helmet to helmet hit in the NFL could be well dealt with in the same way.

If you want to clarify the rule for everyone and start making offensive players taking at least some responsibility for their own safety then you can simply define the penalty of helmet to helmet hit as when a player raises his helmet to above the level of another player’s helmet where the player being contacted is upright. In this case you have a penalty. However, if the defensive player is in the process of tackling and the offensive player by his own volition lowers his helmet below what would be normal shoulder level, for any reason, then he takes the risk of getting hit helmet to helmet. In this instance there is no penalty.

“Volition” is to make a conscious choice to do something. We hear complaints about defenseless receivers, for example, and they get hit helmet to helmet often times when falling after attempting to make an acrobatic catch and are unable to fully control themselves. The league wants to protect these players. But they are putting themselves in that helpless position. Instead of telling the defensive players that they must be the one’s responsible for the safety of all players who choose to put themselves into a vulnerable position, perhaps we need to tell all players that they are responsible for their own actions? Hey, you want to stretch out for a grab, you take your chances. That’s football.

Let’s take the skirts off the offensive players and realize that football is a full contact sport. Punish the blatant intents to injure such as where a blitzing backer launches his helmet into the helmet of a standing quarterback. But let’s at least make all players accountable for their own decisions and that means applying equal scrutiny to the actions of offensive players that might result in helmet to helmet hits.

I doubt this will happen though. Seems to me we have a man in charge of the league that doesn’t have two functioning neurons in his brain. And when that is the case, all you can expect is lunacy.

It will be interesting to see how Roger Goodell reacts to the trouble league golden boy Brett Favre has got himself into.  Goodell set the bar very high when earlier this year he suspended Steelers’ quarter back Ben Roethlisberger for committing no crime except that of being accused of acting inappropriately in a bar with a young, and quite frisky in her own right, young lady.

Farve, in case you have not heard has been apparently caught sexting Jenn Sterger, a former sideline reporter for the New York Jets, pictures of the most naughty sort.  Apparently, so the story goes, two years Sterger rejected Favre’s advanced and the attempts to woo her continued.  Basically, Favre was stalking the reporterette.

Hey, even if the allegations aren’t true Big Ben was suspended six game, since reduced to four, all on allegations too.  So that is the minimum that Favre should get.  But based on what is coming out and Brett’s uncanny silence on the issue it seems there is a little more here than just smoke.  If so and the charges are true Goodell would be forced to levy a harsher punishment on Farve than he did Ben or look like a hypocritical fool.

If true Brett Favre deserves to be suspended for the season.  Then he can retire once and for all in shame only to come back again next year I suppose.

I wanted to talk today about the Pens heading down to Carolina to try and continue their hot start for the month of March, something that seems to be a bit of a tradition in the Burgh as of late.  But no, instead I feel compelled to address another issue; the issue of Steeler’s Quarterback Ben Roethlisberger and the reaction of some people here in Pittsburgh to another accusation of sexual misconduct.

A year ago a fruit loop in Tahoe accused Big Ben of rape.  That case holds about as much water as a sieve.  The woman openly bragged about having Ben’s baby and was, by all legitimate accounts not all that stable mentally.  Now we have another case between Ben and a woman where all sorts of accusations are flying.  And along with those accusations come the inevitable calls from the Ben haters for the head of the Steelers star QB and for him to be run out of town on a rail.

I honestly don’t get it.  The man is accused of a serious crime.  He is not convicted of one.  Sure the accusations are serious but if Big Ben is not guilty of them should he be punished and the target of scorn?  Scorn, I might add, that I think comes from people who never really liked Big Ben and have for years been putting him down since (and even before) that terrible Super Bowl he had against the Seahawks where the team won in spite of him.

I hear the rumors about Ben every day.  Someone’s sister’s best friend didn’t get an autograph when they approached Ben while he was trying to enjoy a dinner in a local restaurant and he is the worst thing since Hitler.  Then there are the ones where people claim he runs out on the check and worse.  These third party sources and callers to sports talk shows around town always seem to have the story but never much to back it up.  The restaurantand the actual people involved are never mentioned and we are given sweeping generalizations.  And to those who bitch about Big Ben not giving you an autograph when you disturb him when he is trying to enjoy a meal?  I personally think you should thank your luck stars that he didn’t put you through the wall for being just that rude.  Yes he is a star quarterback.  But he is not your personal slave who must just at your command.

Yeah, I really do think these same people who are jerks like that or just the type that don’t like Ben and make up all sorts of stories about him are the same ones in overdrive now.  What is worse, I hear that the Steelers organization is a little miffed at Ben too.  But if he isn’t convicted of a crime or doesn’t admit to something why?  Do the brass really hate him all that much?  Is Coach Tomlin that much of a Dixon guy that he would help fuel such animosity?

Hey, if all it takes is an accusation to get someone run out of town here in the Burgh then maybe I should start some really unsavory rumors about the Bob Nutting!  If all it takes is a rumor, true or not, that say Mr. Nutting likes to eat puppies after boiling them alive then maybe we could get someone who gives a damn about baseball into an ownership stake in the Pirates and shed our losing ways at PNC Park.  But no, Pittsburghers seem more than willing to endure a pathetic franchise taking up residence on the North Shore and even an admitted wife beater in one James Harrison than wait until all the facts are in on Ben Roethlisberger.

I mean for Christ’s sakes!  The man won us one Super Bowl and in the case of the game against Seattle played well enough not to lose another.  He lit the league on fire this year and kept Pittsburgh alive in games when the defense, the defense so many can never say a bad thing about, couldn’t have stopped the offense of a junior varisty squad from any local high school.  And what does he get for that?  He gets a bunch of haters who can’t wait to get him out of town and will use anything to justify their burner hate for him.

Ben gets charged and convicted I say you’re right all you naysayers.  He should be gone.  But until that time I want him treated the same way I would want to be treated – innocent until proven guilty.

Stop hating just to hate.  Hey, it’s not Big Ben’s fault he can get a girl ten times hotter than you just by flashing his smile and it is certainly not his fault that you couldn’t even hold his jock strap.

I just cannot go without giving recognition to our Pittsburgh Steelers who, even when it looked like hope was fading, found a way to win against the Arizona Cardinals in the Super Bowl!

I’ll be honest, I didn’t really know if the team had it in them after they allowed the Cardinals to take the lead in the 4th quarter but Big Ben and Santonio Holmes (with a great grab in the end zone) and the entire offense recovered to bring home a sixth Lombardi Trophy to the Steel City.

Congratulations to the Steelers and the ENTIRE STEELERS NATION!

As you know I gave up my Penguins tickets to the Rangers game so that I could rest up for and attend the Steelers-Ravens AFC Championship game at Heinz Field. It was a great game, although I question the wisdom of repeatedly running Willie Parker up into the offensive line for 1 and 2 yards all night and I still question whether Sweed is ready to play football after he once again dropped a pass after cleaning beating the defender. But the good news is that in the battle of the two best defenses in the NFL, Pittsburgh’s D reigned supreme and taught Joe Flacco what it means to get a good butt whopping, picking him off three times including one by Polamalu for a TD that sealed the deal.

Congratulation to the Steelers and good luck in Tampa Bay and Super Bowl XLIII. Ken Whisenhunt has a score to settle after not being offered the Steelers head coaching job so the team had better come to play and kick some butt in order to win.