DK’s Double Shot of Steelers: It was alllll yellow

DK’s Double Shot of Steelers: It was alllll yellow

[Music] [Applause] [Music] Hey guys, welcome to Acer Stadium. I’m Dan Kvachevich. He’s Chris Hack. We’re from DK Pittsburgh Sports. The Steelers and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers just engaged in a spirited Oh, yeah. joint practice. Uh, we say that we can say it was spirited because I talked to some players who confirmed that it was spirited. We’re playing by the rules. and we’re playing by the rules. And for those of you who don’t know what we’re talking about, once you get into these types of settings, meaning closed to the public, the media operates with certain uh limitations and restrictions as to what can be reported. That’s just the nature of football. That’s the nature of the game. Uh it’s not anything we love, but it’s also not anything we can do anything about. That said, what was your imp? Oh, we are allowed to talk about to be clear here. uh what players confirm for us. Okay, so I’m going to start with a little bit of news here. Uh DK Metaf came down on his ankle. I confirmed with him in the end zone. Uh he did return. He told me he’s fine. Um and that’s the best thing that could have come out of today. Yeah. Absolutely. You want to have when you have these type of settings in which you are trying to do your do the best you can to simulate a game, you want to ride that line with get the work done that you need to get done, but also stay healthy. And for Medcaf to have a bit of a scare like that and to still be healthy, to still get back out there, be able to continue practice and finish practice, that’s a good thing for him as well. Um, we’ll see about the rest of the team to see if anybody else was banged up or not, but uh, yeah, spirited. at least one star player comes away, you know, has a little something and stays healthy. Uh, and then they get some other things done. I talked with Pat Fmouth uh afterward. They the offense won seven shots, six to one. You know, this drill that we’ve been talking about every day in training camp, they ran it out here and well, the Steelers offense had its way with the Buccaneers defense in that and that’s including the the starting offense as well. Yeah, I’d say honestly outside of uh outside of any other you know side news that might happen to emerge from this uh that you know somebody was hurt is not not somebody who would affect your fantasy leagues how trying to find a way to relay stuff to you here. Uh, but if there were to be a headline from this, it would be that it would be that the offense uh, and acknowledging they, as they did. I’m not going to keep doing this through the whole show, but the offense fared well. The offense did a lot of good things. Uh, and that included both quarterbacks. Yeah. Yeah, they they did definitely get some work in. I don’t think it was perfect, and I think I I can say, you know, from my own, from what I did see, no, it wasn’t perfect. Yes, there are still things they need to work on. Uh but that’s where you are whenever you’re in the middle of August with still two preseason games to go. Uh Mike Tomlin said before uh practice that the same group of guys that didn’t play in Jacksonville are not going to play uh at least in terms of like non-injury guys. They’re not going to play Saturday against the Buccaneers here at Acer Stadium. We’ll see about some of the injured guys like Calvin Austin and and those guys. They’re still kind of up in the air. But clearly they want to get the work in in this kind of a setting as opposed to preseason where they’re going in there with a fraction of the playbook and it’s not really the stuff that you’re going to see in the regular season. Another thing before we take a quick break is that the offensive line according to the offensive line showed well. So confirming what I saw with my own eyes, what Chris saw with his own eyes, uh I I grabbed Mason McCormack off the field. truth teller, by the way. He has that vibe about him. He always has. Uh he’s not going to BS you. If if they look like they’re lacking a little bit, uh he’s going to say so. If he’s struggling, he’s going to say so. And what he told me, and I’m quoting directly here, was we’re getting better. And he said it like that with a with a firm nod. Uh he likes what he’s seeing. Uh he mentioned a couple of his teammates. He mentioned Brick Jones uh getting better on the left side. But when these guys talk like that, what has to be understood when offensive linemen talk like that, the Wii is the emphasis. The Wii is intentional because everything that they do has to be collective. Yeah, it has to be. And Andy Widel talked about that uh before practice. He also addressed the the media before practice today and he said like, and I quote, “Every time they go out there, they get better.” They get better. Yeah. And that’s that’s that’s his baby, too. Yeah. Yeah. It really is. I mean, literally spent the past two drafts drafting Brick Jones and Troy Falanu and Zack Frasier and Mason McCormack, like drafting these guys to not only, you know, to to beef up the offensive line and to rebuild the trenches, but do it all in one fell swoop pretty much in two drafts so that they can grow together, they can develop this continuity together. So, when you hear a lot of this we talk, it’s real. It’s real and it’s important. Mhm. When we come back, we’re going to tell you about a surprise visitor to this practice and uh we’re going to get to the conversations that we had with the players coming off the field. At DK Pittsburgh Sports, we take pride in coverage that connects our city’s fans to their favorite teams. Now that connection’s stronger than ever. Introducing our all-new state-of-the-art app. Find expert inside reporting and original podcasts. Check live box scores. Track the latest stats. Chat it up with our community of thousands of fans all in one place. The new app from DK Pittsburgh Sports. Coverage that connects. [Music] Welcome back to Acers Stadium. A quarterback from the past and potentially two quarterbacks from the future were here. Ben Rothllessberger and his his two boys uh were on hand. Charlie Batch was on hand. Ben and Charlie tight as ever watching the practice together from the sideline uh brought back a lot of memories. Uh and at the same time, you can tell that it would have affected guys who played with Ben and and there was one of those that you talked to today. Yeah, I talked with Pat Frymouth. Had a chance to talk about what we talked about earlier in the in the show talking about, you know, how this is a really important practice. But then, of course, knowing Pat Footh, really enjoyed playing with Ben Rothosberger. Had to ask about that. So, here’s a couple minutes with uh Pat Footh. Aaron’s talked about the uh the value of this type of a practice as opposed to preseason. Preseason, you guys are going to tip your hand, show what you’re doing. In a setting like this, you’re able to work on a little bit more of what you can actually do during the season. Do you feel like you guys were able to get a good start on that? Yeah, for sure. Sure. I mean, obviously, you know, we ran most of our base stuff and um you know, I thought we we did a a great job on offense for the most part. Obviously, some things that you’re going to want to clean up like like every day out here, but um for the most part, I thought it was solid. Um looking forward to um on Saturday. Special visitor today. Was uh uh good to see Ben. Yeah, it was great to see Ben. Um great to chop it up with him, great to see his kids. Um you know, he’s always one of my all-time favorites and uh it was great to see him. You can kind of tell from Frier Mouthuth’s vibe there that he was he was into what the offense did and into what the offense can do, right? Oh, yeah. Absolutely. Like they have a lot of confidence in what they’re going to be able to do offensively. I know there’s a lot of concern on the outside about wide receiver 2 or the offensive line, but these guys have a lot of faith in what’s being built in Arthur Smith and what he’s doing and developing this offense and of course in having a four-time MVP playing quarterback like you know and it’s funny like again I’d love to be able to go into specifics but watching some of the things that Aaron Rogers did today in terms of pre- snap stuff and in terms of like exchanges with NFL referees who are here. Man, I tell you what, it’s easy to see why these guys really like playing. I mean, he’s in charge and that’s that’s the picture that we’ve been painting for you from out in Latroe. He’s in charge. He’s in command uh of the field when he’s out there. He’s in command of the team in some ways. It’s been something to see in such a short but not span, but not in a narcissistic way. Not in this guy, in this way. Yeah. Not in a look at me way. Perceived from the outside like, oh, I’m going to come in and I’m going to rip up Arthur Smith’s playbook and here’s my playbook and this is what we’re going to run. It’s not like that. Arthur, by the way, happiest dude in this whole big bowl of yellow. Arthur, it just has a big smile on his face that you can’t peel off. He’s excited about what’s coming. I grabbed Jaylen Warren off on the way off the field because, you know, they didn’t tackle running backs here, so this isn’t like preseason, okay? But in the practice setting, as practice settings go, this was as much uh of work as you can get for running backs without, you know, doing the, you know, the allout real thing here. Yeah. And the running game, I’ll say this, is a work in progress. Okay. It’s not where they want it to be. It’s not where they need it to be. Yep. Uh here’s what Jaylen had to say in the little one-on-one that I had with him in the in the other end zone over there. Jaylen Warren, Pittsburgh Steelers. How’d that feel? Real real football almost. Yeah. Yeah, I loved it. Yeah. What What was the competit the competition like out there for you guys? Yeah, it was it was good. You know, iron on iron. Uh they had some, you know, great competition. We have great competition on those. It’s always good to have days like this. Where’s this offense right now? Are you excited about it? Tell me just about where you are with it. Oh, I’m I’m all the way in. You know, we we there. We there. I’m excited to put on display. What have you seen from the kid? The kid. Caleb Johnson. Uh, you know, he’s developing, you know, he’s, uh, he’s doing his thing, you know. Uh, I’m excited for him. I’m excited to, you know, gam in stadium cuz, you know, that’s that’s a dog right there. Jaylen is the chattiest sort, is he not? He’s amenable. He’s amenable. He wasn’t trying to get rid of me. He just That’s how he answers stuff. Yep. I mean, listen, I talked about Aaron Rogers and the things that he does during practice. The one way I can describe him of my own opinion and this is the way he talks with the media. I’m not talking about specifically with this practice. He is a straight shooter and Jaylen’s like it works with a lot of these guys because Jaylen’s the same way. He’s just he’s just going to say exactly what he’s thinking. There’s no fluff or anything. He’s just going to say what he’s thinking. Yeah. And and he and he did that right across the board as you heard. Uh, and listen, we can debate whether or not this is a run first team or this is going to be a run first team, but it has to be a run at some point team. It has to be a run when we need to establish the run kind of team, doesn’t it? Absolutely. Listen, the last thing you want to do is become the 2024 Jets. That’s the last thing you want to do. You do not want to ask Aaron Rogers. You do not. The good Jets were good. Yeah, the bad Jets is the ones he’s talking about. The 2024 New York Jets, New Jersey Jets, however you want to say, but they they they were last in the league in rush attempts. They Ro Aaron Rogers was second in the league in pass attempts. You don’t want to have that kind of imbalance. And the only way you get to that is either one, you don’t want to run the football, or you can’t run the football. Now, we know the Steelers want to run the football. That’s not a question. The question is going to be, can they run the football effectively? And that could be the thing that ultimately defines their entire season because it almost seems like the defense is going to be the defense because if the Steelers can run the football and then they’re able to use play action and quick game and and uh RPOS’s and everything else off of the run game, that opens up everything and then the offense can score 24 25 points a game. And then with that defense, you that should win you a lot of games. It it opens up a lot of different things. I agree with that. I also feel like which one is the horse and which one is the cart doesn’t matter too much. If the team is capable of stretching the field, if the team is capable offensively of dynamic things, then that’s going to open things up for Jaylen. It’s going to open things up, you know, for Caleb. It’s going to open things up for Kenny Johnson. It’s going to open things up for the short game in general and the tight ends too. And that comes down to DK Metaf. For those of you who’ve been eagerly awaiting the first DK on DK interview here, it finally happened. He was signing some autographs right over there where you see those those gray seats there. And he gets done and he turns around and he sees me and he goes, “You need me?” And I go, “Yep.” And I turn on the video camera and this happened. DK Medaf the timing that you and Aaron are developing. You can see it in Latro. see it everywhere. What’s it been like for you? Uh, I mean, it’s just been fun. Uh, like you said, just getting the timing down, getting the offense down, trying to find my footing in the offense, and, uh, yeah, just trying to build one day at a time. Does he challenge you in that way, you know, to make sure that you’re, you know, you’re really, really sharp on those routes? Oh, yes, sir. Uh, he’ll challenge me on the field, off the field, throwing signals at me, um, you know, ask me questions in the hallway, um, trying to see what I, what I would do against different coverages. So, it’s always, um, a learning experience for me. Want to hear a really sharp observation on my part? What’s that? He is huge. It just It never occurs to you the entire time you’re speaking with him that he’s a wide receiver. No. Like you know you are. Uhhuh. But it’s just it doesn’t make it all the way through. It’s like Darnell and offensive line. Yeah. You just don’t say to yourself, “This is a tight end. This isn’t someone who’s catching passes.” And I think that’s almost as true of Metaf because of the nature of the passes that he that he goes after. Oh, yeah. Absolutely. I I mean I remember training camp practices in which the Steelers would run out there with an empty set, but it’s 13 personnel and I actually thought at one point they have four tight ends on the field. No, no, it was legitimately three tight ends and the one receiver was DK Metaf. It was eight left tackles. The smallest guy on the field in that, not this practice, but in training camp practice I’m talking about was Connor Hayward. he was the smallest guy on the field and it’s just funny how like just how he dwarfs the rest of the the receiver position u not just on this team but throughout the rest of the NFL. They have a lot of X factor this team does in terms of size and when you’re talking about on the offensive side on the defensive side you’re talking about YA Black and and other guys they’ve become a bigger stronger football team back into referencing Andy Widle again. Yeah. Um, that is the whitel mold. That is I don’t care who this offends and I don’t think he does either. It’s the Eagles mold. It is. It’s not like they’re a bad example to be following. No, we’re talking about defending Super Bowl champions won another Super Bowl. Andy’s been a part of that. And and if there’s anybody I mean, the NFL is a copycat league. I’m not saying you have to go out there and grab Shawn McVeyy’s playbook from 5 years ago and try to build your own version of that. It’s not that kind of thing. But there are certain core principles that that almost work across. It doesn’t matter what kind of an offense you run. Having a dominant offensive line gives you that ability to do almost anything, whether you want to be a zone team, a gap team, whatever you want to do. You know, you have to be able to protect the quarterback. You have to be able to open up running lanes for for the run game. And the Eagles do that very well. It doesn’t matter if they’ve had Saquon Barkley or Miles Sanders or whoever has been the running back. And they’re a good team to look at and like, okay, we want to build our team that way. That’s obviously not going to be the same thing. the the Steelers have man coverage guys that the Eagles, as good as their secondary is, it’s different. And the thing is, they even took one of the guys from They took one of the Eagles guys. Yeah. Guys, I have three words for you here at the end of the show. Get the app. Uh the next thing we’re going to be doing, Chris is going to uh head back here to the media room at Acashure and I’m going to head uh back under the river to our headquarters downtown and we’re going to be putting together a bunch of content uh for the DK Pittsburgh Sports app which you can get dkps.net/apple dkps.net/android. It’s free but there’s also an adree version that to be honest with you is only a hundred times better thousand%. And if if you don’t like the cost, if you don’t like the cost of the premium service, email me, okay? I’ll take care of it myself. Uh dk dk pittsburghports.com. Spell all that out. I’m totally serious. I’ll get you twothirds off the subscription rate to make that app adree. You will love it. And we will see you guys tomorrow with a live show.

The Steelers relish a spirited joint practice with the Buccaneers

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