Yes, it was only the first Pre-Season exhibition game of the season, and yes, most of the guys you saw playing last night will be starting their life's work as butchers, bakers, or candlestick makers in about three more months, but wasn't it nice to see an NFL football game again last night? Even if the score doesn't mean anything, it's nice when your team wins, so I really enjoyed watching the Steelers beat the Packers last night in the first game of the "Mike McCarthy Era".
Some "quick hit" thoughts from the cranium of The Grandstander on last night's game....
- Steelers fans cannot be anything less than ecstatic over the quarterback play of Mason Rudolph, Will Howard, and Drew Allar. The three combined to go 27-for-33 for 313 yards, 2 TD, and 0 INT. Howard looked really good in leading a drive downfield for a touchdown with under a minute to play in the first half.
- And how impressive was rookie WR Germi Bernard? Five catches for 51 yards which included lots of YAK yardage as well. The word from training camp was that Bernard wasn't looking that great, and that he wasn't jelling with Aaron Rodgers. Well, he looked pretty damn good in actual game action last night. Maybe he just isn't a good "practice player". Franco Harris was never especially good in practice either, as I recall. If Bernard become half that player that Harris was, I'll take it!
- I'm not as smart as all the people who call sports talk shows, so I am not going to comment on things like offensive and defensive line play. I know that in the telecast last night, ex-Steeler Merril Hoge was raving about the play of the Steelers defense, so I'll take his word for it. It was a defense that didn't yield a touchdown last night.
- Back to the quarterbacks, it sure was great to see an offensive scheme that called for throwing downfield and across the middle last night. Looks like the remnants of the Matt Canada and Arthur Smith offenses have been swept into the dustbin. Sure hope that that continues.
- Aaron Rodgers, along with a whole bunch of other first stringers, didn't even suit up last night. Pre-season football is not "real football" according to A-a-ron. He did get the chance to have chat with his successor in Green Bay during warm-ups though.
- Did you play the "Bob Pompeani Drinking Game" last night during the telecast? This is where you take a shot of your favorite adult libation whenever Pomp states that this-or-that Steelers player has either "looked good in training camp", "has been having a great training camp", or "has been outstanding in camp" or some variation on that theme. If you did, you would have been plastered by halftime. I stopped counting after five such references. He made two such references to Asante Samuel Jr. alone! No Steeler player is a bad one in Pomp's world.
- On the ugly side, how about all those penalties? That was not good, although the team did seem to clean that up in the second half.
We all know that these games are meaningless, but, like I said, it's always nice when your team wins!
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