The Bengals and the Steelers, both playoff teams a year ago. Both coming into this season with high hopes and expecting to make the playoff's. Bengals have AJ, Andy & Hill. Steelers have Ben, Brown and Bell. All great players. The reality is our teams went from being really good to being below average this season. Throw in the Ravens too.
They are not as good as they used to be. Is it the coaching? Marvin and Tomlin seem to be out of it a lot of the time. Do the players not give a crap? Some pundits picked the Steelers to go to the Superbowl. Are you kidding me. Their defense is pathetic. Speaking of defense, The Bengals had a very good defense last year I thought. What happened? Has the NFL media machine hyped these teams up to make us watch? Has the style of play in our division old school and doesn't work anymore? Coaching, ownership, injuries. This stuff is painful to watch anymore. What happened?

well the Bengals have had coaching changes this year which has impacted the defense.

In terms of common themes across steelers, ravens, bengals...i don't know, maybe the last 2-3 drafts have not delivered the quality depth required to consistently replenish their squads??

its funny 'cos the AFC North seems to get praise from outside for being one of the best divisions every year but when you look at our recent drafts have any of us knocked it out of the park with 3 quality starters every draft recently??

Newsome always gets praised as some team building genius but i don't think the ravens have hit often enough of late. Duke Tobin for us has recently got attention for his draft work ...unfortunately that seems to have come right off the back of 2 questionable drafts (maybe 3 depending on how this years class plays out).

We each still have a core of good players to build around (Flacco, Dalton, ben, AB, Mosley, Shazier, Green, Brown) but i think the depth and quality of our 'average' starters appears to have dipped

For the Bengals, their O-line has went south for the winter. Which is a bit surprising because they generally have had good O-lines for the past decade. The back-to-back fourth quarter sacks yesterday just go to prove what Bengal fans have been seeing all season. And the loss of Sanu and the other receiver in FA have hurt as well. Now that we have a lackluster Offense, maybe other teams will stop stealing our OC's away in the offseason. Of course, now we really WANT them to steal our OC!!!

PIT has generally had a good O-line this year. Possibly the best they have had in a long time. But I think you D has taken a step back.

The Bengals will be the 1 in the Browns' 1-15. Piss pathetic bunch of chumps.

Maybe the coaching is getting stale?  All of these cats, except for Hue, have been around for quite a while now.


Our o line is pathetic, and the defense seemingly aged overnight.  Losing Nelson didn't help any matters either.

Coaching has a lot to do with it. Especially three teams with long tenured HCs. Baltimore's problem is Offense and not playing any type of modern offensive scheme.

Interesting. The Steelers defense is worthless. I thought the Bengals defense was the best in the division last year. This year they appear to be having problems. the Bengals were 12-4 last year. They had it all going their way (except for the fluke playoff loss). So as a fan you would think this year we move forward still. then they go back wards. Seems nowadays that window of opportunity gets smaller and smaller and you better take advantage of it while you can. When Big Ben retires the Steelers are going to stink for a number of years. The way our three teams are playing, they all need to be home on the couch come playoff time. At least everyone is still getting their big money.

(11-16-2016, 08:43 AM)ballsofsteel Wrote: Interesting. The Steelers defense is worthless. I thought the Bengals defense was the best in the division last year. This year they appear to be having problems. the Bengals were 12-4 last year. They had it all going their way (except for the fluke playoff loss). So as a fan you would think this year we move forward still. then they go back wards. Seems nowadays that window of opportunity gets smaller and smaller and you better take advantage of it while you can. When Big Ben retires the Steelers are going to stink for a number of years. The way our three teams are playing, they all need to be home on the couch come playoff time. At least everyone is still getting their big money.

Yup.  A lot of us have been screaming for a top tier FA or two to help push this team over the top before the proverbial window shut.  Typical Mike Brown, didn't happen.

You know its a down year when a division smack talk thread becomes a consolation thread.

Just wow.
2016 is the worst.

To take it one step further, look at Green Bay and Carolina, they stink now to. Qhat is this world coming to. The only givens is that the Patriots are good as usual and the Browns suck as usual.

I has to be the coaching. There are probably many nuances that change in the game, but the coaching either doesn't adjust properly or did not evolve to handle these nuances. As I've said before - bad coaching can neutralize the best player(s).

(11-15-2016, 07:48 AM)ballsofsteel Wrote: What happened?

Nothing happened....the steelers have always sucked.

(11-15-2016, 07:48 AM)ballsofsteel Wrote: The Bengals and the Steelers, both playoff teams a year ago. Both coming into this season with high hopes and expecting to make the playoff's. Bengals have AJ, Andy & Hill. Steelers have Ben, Brown and Bell. All great players. The reality is our teams went from being really good to being below average this season. Throw in the Ravens too.
They are not as good as they used to be. Is it the coaching? Marvin and Tomlin seem to be out of it a lot of the time. Do the players not give a crap? Some pundits picked the Steelers to go to the Superbowl. Are you kidding me. Their defense is pathetic. Speaking of defense, The Bengals had a very good defense last year I thought. What happened? Has the NFL media machine hyped these teams up to make us watch? Has the style of play in our division old school and doesn't work anymore? Coaching, ownership, injuries. This stuff is painful to watch anymore. What happened?

This year?

The Steelers have always been a buncha ****suckers.