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Fixing What’s Broken: Part 2 - The Running Game

It’s time for some triage in the Steel City. The team is reeling after losing three of its last five games and has simply looked outclassed in each loss. This is part two of a week-long series detailing what can be done in the short- and long-term to stop the bleeding.

How can I sit here and malign a running game that has produced a guy who has been in the top two in the league essentially all season, and currently leads the likes of LaDanian Tomlinson and rookie sensation Adrian Peterson? Simple: looking at the numbers, this season is an anomally. We aren’t likely to see a single runner exceed 1,700 yards, which has only happened two other times since the 2000 season started — and one of those times, two players were within four yards of the mark. Adrian Peterson is a mere 39 yards behind in third place, and that’s after missing two full games. Second place is Willis McGahee, a guy who is average at his very best any year but this one.

Now, don’t think I’m deriding the Steeler most likely to lead the league in rushing. He’s had virtually no offensive line to run behind, so considering how few times he’s had anything but a sea of opponents in front of him, he’s performed admirably. If he had the Dallas line in front of him, he’d likely be flirting not just with team history, but with league history. No, this isn’t about Willie Parker.

Mike Tomlin has done an amazing job as a rookie head coach, especially with just five previous years in the league at any level. But he started the season off by making one of the most boneheaded moves in recent Steelers history: he took Dan Kreider, the best lead blocker in the league, off the game-day roster and replaced him with Carey Davis — who is no slouch of a runner, but a) isn’t half the fullback that Kreider is, and b) performs infinitely better carrying the ball than he does blocking for the guy who’s holding it.

Fortunately, Tomlin came to his senses after we all repeatedly watched Davis blow assignments and get lit up by linebackers. Kreider was back on the roster, but — mysteriously — was rarely on the field. Parker, who was very vocal about his desire to have Danny K. blocking for him on every down, was stuffed more often than not when put in single-back situations. Ben Roethlisberger has been able to take a lot of heat off him by playing to Pro Bowl levels, and that has served to open a few holes for Parker, but most of what Fast Willie has achieved this season has been a result of nothing less than his absolute brilliance when improvising after the offensive line blew most of their assignments.

Now the team is in even bigger trouble, as they (hopefully) head to the post-season with their fullback in street clothes until 2008. Shockingly, Parker managed 100 yards on 14 carries on Sunday, but that was entirely due to his ability to bounce outside. He seemingly put the team on his shoulders for the first three quarters, before Roethlisberger finally got enough blocking up front to actually have time to throw the ball in the fourth quarter. And 27 of his 100 yards came on a backward, desperation pass from Roethlisberger that would have been a reception rather than a run had Parker been another two feet forward when he caught it.

In the short term, there are a few things the team can do to help FWP find running lanes.

1) Roll Roethlisberger out on pass plays. Believe it or not, this could be huge, and will help the running game as much as it does the passing game. Most Steelers’ play-action plays involve Ben dropping back, faking a hand-off, and then attempting to throw from the pocket. He’s a threat to break a huge play any time he gets outside the pocket, and prefers to be outside the pocket. Rolling him out, primarily to the right after faking a handoff left, will begin to draw defenders to the right side of the offense. By calling a few designed quarterback runs and downfield throws from these rollouts, defenders will eventually leave Parker more and more open, giving him far more room to run by making the defense play on their heels.

2) Slide Matt Spaeth back to the fullback position. Spaeth has played as well as can be expected as a receiver this year, given that he’s behind Heath Miller, the most underrated tight end in the league and one of Roethlisberger’s favorite targets. But when asked to block from the line, he tends to blow his assignments or lose the leverage battle. By giving him a head of steam out of the backfield, at 6′8″ and more than 260 pounds, the playing field will be leveled because of his sheer size and decent speed. Carey Davis certainly isn’t cutting it at fullback, and Parker’s smallish size essentially requires that he have a lead blocker. The simple fact is that teams are going to put seven or eight guys in the box to stop Parker on first and second down. He has the ability to run right at them even when they expect it, but he’s not built like Jerome Bettis; he needs some help up front to give him room to work with.

3) Call more off-tackle runs. NFL defenses are generally too fast to run well against continuously all the way to the outside, and teams know the Steelers like to run up the gut, so they stack the middle. That leaves off-tackle gaps slightly less defended. Stack that on top of swapping Sean Mahan and Kendall Simmons, as I suggested yesterday, and pulling Mahan or Faneca on off-tackle runs could mean a lot more runs like we saw Parker make on Sunday, when he went off-tackle on most runs purely out of necessity.

Long-term, the Steelers need to look at finally getting a devoted backup fullback. Kreider is reaching that point in his career when Steeler fullbacks typically start to feel the pain from years of being the first person to get hit at speed on a run play, just as Tim Lester and Jon Witman before him. He’ll be back next season, and possibly a year or two beyond that, but there needs to be someone capable waiting in the wings.

On top of that, the offensive line needs to be revamped. I covered that yesterday at length. This group has failed Parker and his backup, Najeh Davenport, miserably this season. They failed Roethlisberger too, and that has a big impact on the run game just as much as it does the passing game. Teams are blitzing the Steelers at will lately, knowing that they can get into the backfield on nearly every play and disrupt the timing. It doesn’t matter if it’s a run or a pass: having defenders hounding you when trying to either hand off or take a five-step drop will cause problems every time.

Finally, the coaching needs work. My opinion is that Larry Zeirlein, the offensive line coach, should be fired. This team needs someone who cares more about blocking schemes than he does sending “inappropriate e-mails.” And Bruce Arians is as much at fault as anyone. There’s been no creativity in the Steelers’ play-calling this season aside from throwing on a lot of first downs. As one blogger (I’ve now forgotten who, so my apologies to whoever it was) questioned yesterday, why did it take until week 15 before we finally saw the Steelers run a trick play (referring to the Cedric Wilson wide receiver pass for the tying two-point conversion)?

If the running game was more than dysfunctional, Willie Parker’s numbers could have been astronomical this year. It’s a shame he was one of just five offensive players, alongside Roethlisberger, Kreider, Hines Ward and Miller, who have played with any measurable level of intensity every single week.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, December 18th, 2007 at 9:00 pm and is filed under Carey Davis, Dan Kreider, Sean Mahan, Heath Miller, Matt Spaeth, Alan Faneca, Najeh Davenport, Hines Ward, Ben Roethlisberger, Willie Parker, Bruce Arians, Kendall Simmons, Mike Tomlin, offensive line. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.