Bell Calls Defense "Just plain flat-out lazy, don't want to hustle"

Ted Bouchette of the Post Gazette finally did something worthwhile, interviewing LB Kendrell Bell.� Here's the key part of that interview:

Q: Before that game, do you believe the defense was playing up to standards?

BELL: No, I don't think so. I do a radio show and I [say] every week, we shoot ourselves in the feet, either jumping offsides, missing tackles, just plain flat-out being lazy and don't want to hustle.�

Yep, that's exactly correct, and it's a point I have harped on time and time and time again this season.� Even during an on-air segment for Profootballcentral.com a few weeks ago, I noted how this defense lacks tenacity, malice, hard hitting, and swarming to the football.� All Ken Bell did was validate what I've been writing the entire season.�

Of course, Bouchette was totally floored and bewildered by Bell's statement.� Bouchette wrote a follow-on article to that interview, saying, "That's a pretty serious charge, that teammates are lazy and don't want to hustle. Where are the coaches, if that's the case? I don't know if it's been apparent to anyone watching their games. I would not have known."

I would not have known, says Ted Bouchette.� Yes, indeed.� Of course Bouchette would not have known.� He's too busy fawning and gushing over his favorite players, such as Doughboy Bettis, Stonefoot Bruener, and Jason GilDong, just to name a few.� Film study?� Bouchette -- and every other local media member -- has never heard of it.� Bouchette claims, "I don't know if it's been apparent to anyone watching their games."� Yes, Ted�it's been quite apparent to this writer, and to the hard-core fans of this site.�

That's precisely why this here site was established in 1999 -- to provide rugged, in-depth analysis of the Pittsburgh Stillers.�

This defense is soft and cheesy.� Aside from the Clev game last week, they haven't hit a soul the entire season.� You'll recall that, almost every week this season, I've written, "Another game complete, another game in which no bone-jarring, tooth rattling hit was laid by a Stiller defender on an opposing player.� Not one."� Finally, in game #11, the Stillers defense finally made a bone-jarring, tooth rattling hit, in the name of Ken Bell on little James Jackson on a goal-line plunge.�

I'd noted after the Monday night game, "Fat John Madden blathered on and on before the game, "I really like this defense."�� Tell us, Fat Madden -- exactly what is there to like about The Softee Defense?� Unless one has a craving for soft ice cream, I can't think of a single thing to "like" about this defense."�

This defense has been content to make the average stops of ballcarriers, and nothing more.� Aside from the Clev game, you don't see a gang of defenders SWARMING to the ball.� You rarely ever see a defender blast the piss out of a ballcarrier when another defender is holding that ballcarrier.� Instead, defenders stand around and watch the ballcarrier fall harmlessly to the turf.� And you don't see defenders scraping and "cleaning off the pile" during a scrum around a ballcarrier or a fumble.�

And who's to blame for this softee style of play?� Who's to blame for what Bell says is "flat-out being lazy, don�t want to hustle" brand of defense?��

Two people:� Billy Cowher and Jason GilDong.

Where are the coaches, Bouchette asks?� Cowher's the head coach.� He oversees everything.� He's the one who gives players more time off than a teacher's union.� He's created a country club atmosphere where players have a SOFT training camp and a posh weekly regimen, and whenever the going gets tough, the team goes to the movie theater.� He's overseen an atmosphere of soft practices.� And he's done nothing to promulgate a swarming, hard-hitting defense.� Think Parcells would have sat back and ALLOWED this kind of feeble, lethargic defense to take place, week after week after week?�� Absolutely not.� But with Billy Cowher, there's no incentive for a veteran to hit and lay out his body, because he knows the chances of being replaced by an inexperienced greenhorn are about the same as winning a PowerBall lottery.� Billy also has been the architect of the "read and react" defense, where most everyone sits passively, partially because the coaching staff has instructed them that they must memorize the defensive playbook in no less than 3 foreign languages, and partially because Cowher has this fascination with turning tough football players into cerebral "students of the game" and "on field coaches".� In doing so, Cowher has taken the reckless abandon away from hitters such as Kendrell Bell, and has placed the team's best, most electric pass rusher (Joey Porter) back in pass coverage on a majority of passing plays.

Jason GilDong is the "defensive captain", and as such, he's supposed to be LEADING BY EXAMPLE.� He's supposed to SET the tone for this defense with hustle, grit, tenacity, and intensity.� THAT'S WHAT REAL DEFENSIVE CAPTAINS DO.� He's done none of that the entire season, nor has he in any of the seasons in which he's been the captain.� He's played soft and feeble -- more so than any other defender on the team.� Ted Bouchette, never wanting to slam a media darling like GilDong, weakly writes, "�Jason Gildon is slowing down."� Slowing down?� He's NO slower than he ever was.� He was never fast, and he's never been injured -- it's hard to be injured when you have AVOIDED contact your entire career.� GilDong is playing exactly the same way he's played his entire career.� It's just that this season, aside from the Arizona game in which the Cards chose to leave him UNBLOCKED the entire game, he's not getting all the freebie opportunities for Dong sacks and slop stops.� He's known as Joggin' Jason, and he earns that nickname every week by loafing and jogging, and weakly titty-jousting with opposing blockers.� We've shown pictures of dozens of plays this season alone in which Jason has TURNED his back to a blocker; waved and flailed at a nearby ballcarrier; and other half-hearted, half-assed stunts that are an outright disgrace to the fans and city of Pittsburgh.� When Bell talks about the defense being flat-out lazy and not wanting to hustle, he's really referring to ONE man, and his name is Jason GilDong.� Those of us who isolate on Jason during games &/or film study know this is 100% factual.� It's the imbeciles like Bouchette who are all puzzled and bewildered.� Bell sees what's happening on the field, and he's seen the films.� He knows, just as well as we here at Stillers.com, that GilDong is a loafing, no-hustle gimcrack.� At the absurd sum of $6M per annum, everyone should expect more from Jason The Gimcrack, but time after time, Jason is given a "pass" or is befitted with one lame-assed excuse after another.� If we didn't know any better, we'd swear Bill Clinton's old publicity team was working feverishly, around the clock, making up the rationalizations and feeble excuses for GilDong that we're fed on a daily basis by the Pittsburgh media.�

Billy Cowher and Jason GilDong.� When this is your leadership, you end up with a defense that is just plain flat-out lazy and doesn't want to hustle.� To think otherwise is to ignore the blatant facts of what's transpired this season and to propagate the head-in-the-sand management style that is killing this football team.�

(Still Mill and Stillers.com -- the only nationally read coverage on the Pittsburgh Stillers that has accurately predicted the how's and the why's of the past 3 Stiller playoff losses�.)