Steelers win in OT

The Steelers won this morning in OT over the Ravens 23-20. The Steelers' offense looked horrible in the first half and it was starting to look like another nightmare manhandling for the second week in a row. But thank goodness someone showed up in the second half to actually score a touchdown.  Santonio Holmes had a great TD catch that we're still not sure how went through the defender, and getting those YACs to score a TD was great, making several defenders miss. James Harrison and LaMarr Woodley are beasts. Period. Jeff Reed was clutch as usual and made all of his kicks (made all of his kicks? does that even make sense? oh well, it's 2:30 am). Jeff Reed is a little under-appreciated we think. He's done a lot of good for the Steelers and makes practically every field goal, including the long ones. Even though he goes to bars and gets drunk and takes shirtless pictures with women, takes off his clothes and takes bad cell phone shots that appear on the internet, and goes to hockey games and gets drunk and argues with people about college basketball teams, it's okay. So here's to you Jeff Reed, a drink of your choice. You deserve it! If we weren't so tired, we'd come up with some more stuff to point out.

On the bad news front, the Steelers have lost Rashard Mendenhall and Kendall Simmons for the rest of the season. They will both be placed on injured reserve. Mendenhall has a fractured shoulder, while Simmons has a torn Achilles tendon. Andre Frazier was carted off the field after the opening kickoff. He appeared to move his legs on the field and gave the fans a wave as he left strapped to a backboard, and we found out after the game that he will be fine, although he does have a spine injury. Lastly (we hope) on the injury list is Carey Davis, who left the game in the fourth quarter with a sprained ankle. At this time, the Steelers only have one healthy running back in Mewelde Moore. Darnell Stapleton replaced Simmons, who played with the first team for the first time in his two years of being with the Steelers. This is a hard blow to the Steelers, especially having to go to Jacksonville next week for Sunday night football. Hopefully the replacements can step up.

Speaking of injuries, another injury is a huge blow, but this time to the Pens. Sergei Gonchar will have surgery on his dislocated shoulder and will miss four to six months. This is extremely bad news for the Pens and extremely unfortunate. He will definitely be missed. We're hoping Goligoski steps up and plays well. We were looking forward to seeing him anyway, now he's got a huge opening to help fill.

Turning points in Steelers win.

Woodley, Harrison seal the deal.

Stars step up and save the game for the Steelers.

Steelers report card.

Gerry Dulac's Two-minute drill.

Pens headlines, with news from Sweden.

Richard Collier is paralyzed after being shot 14 times earlier this month. Extremely unfortunate.

Don't forget to watch Yinz Luv 'Da Stillers sometime today when the new episode is up.

That's all from us, hopefully we covered it all. See you soon.

(Matt Freed/Post-Gazette)

This was by far our favorite picture from tonight. If you'd like to caption that, feel free.

Pens updates

(Peter Diana/Post-Gazette)

The opening of hockey season is just days away and we couldn't be more excited. We always know something big is coming up when the Post-Gazette has their features. We really like the picture above, it's nice. Marc-Andre looks fun-loving and happy, very friendly and approachable. Sid looks like a happy leader. Geno, on the other hand, looks like he's posing for one of those romance novels. He's saying 'I am sexy, you know you want me.' Very 'come hither, I want you now.' And a little like, 'I know something you don't.' Great picture Geno, very captivating. And much better than this one. C'mon ladies, which guy would you rather have? (That picture seriously scares us.)

But on a more serious note, Post-Gazette has a bunch of hockey stuff today, starting with this. PG also asks, now that Sid has turned 21, can he still be 'Sid the Kid'? Sid answered that question himself, sort of, tonight on the Spotlight show, Back For More on FSN. Dan Potash sat down with Crosby for his third, In My Own Words, that will air on October 3rd at 7:30 and will air throughout the first half of the season according to FSN. Be sure to check that out if you can, or hope someone puts it on YouTube for those of you who can't. We would, but we're not that technologically advanced.

Up next at the PG is Five stories to watch this season. History is also the Pens number one opponent this year. The Red Wings also have repeating issues.

Tyler Kennedy signed a two-year extension with the Pens last week.

The Penguins have landed in Sweden.

The Pens have a travel blog from Sweden on their website here.

The Pens had dreams when they were little, and they all weren't about hockey.

Don't forget to check out Empty Netters at the PG all season long. Seth does a great job and he's always on top of things.

Marian Hossa is also back to running his mouth. He offered some expert advice on a comparison between Sidney Crosby and Pavel Datsyuk. We'll let you read that advice for yourself, but the bottom line is he's basically saying that he thinks Datsyuk is better than Crosby. Seriously, when is he going to shut up?

Be sure to head over to the Steelers section of the PG to check out their game-day coverage. The Steelers play Monday night at 8:30 on ESPN. But we're sure you already knew that.

Pens updates coming soon

(Photo By Dave Sandford/Getty Images)

Check out Brooks Orpik's face, far right.

Steelers play Eagles at 4:15, Gonchar injured in Pens preseason game.

The Steelers will play the Eagles today at 4:15 in Philadelphia. This should be a good test for the Steelers. Unfortunately, we won't get to see it. We get to watch the Browns and Ravens game at 4:15. Why, we have no idea whatsoever. A big thank you to the NFL for their stupid rules. We don't live in Ohio or Maryland, we live in Pennsylvania, so why are we watching the Browns and the Ravens? Stupid.

Moving on, last night the Penguins played their first preseason game against the Tampa Bay Lighting at Mellon Arena and lost 5-4 in a shootout. Unfortunately, Sergei Gonchar was injured on a hit from David Koci in the first period. He will be getting evaluated today and possibly an MRI early in the week. Hopefully he doesn't miss much time and everything will be fine. You can read about it here and here.

There is also a pretty good article on the possibility of Malkin being an alternate captain this year over at the Trib. Most of his teammates and Coach Therrien agree he is fit for the honor. Malkin, though, has some reservations.

"There are more people, older ... not me, no way," Malkin said. "Maybe a couple years more. I need to speak English."

We think Malkin would do just fine, and the honor would probably do him good, as his teammates think. He seems to understand most English and is obviously getting better at speaking it. We look forward to hearing more English from Geno soon.

That's all for our post tonight, we're going to get some sleep. But feel free to head on over to the Post-Gazette for the best Steelers coverage around. And of course, HERE WE GO STEELERS, HERE WE GO!

Breaking news: Evgeni Malkin addresses fans in English!

You read that correct people, Geno spoke all English at a season ticket town hall event yesterday. We tried to find video of this great event, but unfortunately, could not find one. We figure the Pens official site should have a video up soon, at least we hope. It was streamed live on the Pens site, but as of now there is no video to watch on demand. Some of you may be wondering, isn't there bigger news today? Yeah, there is, but we like to have fun more than anything and we love accents. So here's to hoping we here Geno soon. ;-)

In other Pens news, Michel Therrien was knocked down during practice yesterday by 6'5" forward Kevin Veilleux when he fell. Therrien apparently has bruised ribs. Please also go to the Pens page over at the PG for articles on Mark Eaton and Janne Pesonen and more.

In big Steelers news, the Rooney brothers have told Stanley Druckenmiller that they are turning down his offer, and he has withdrawn his bid. It doesn't mean that they are selling their shares to Dan Rooney and his son Art II unfortunately. You can read all the specifics here.

Ben Roethlisberger ended up with a reception yesterday after statistics for Sunday night's game were changed by the Elias Sports Bureau that handles the stats for the NFL. The stat was originally a sack by Browns nose tackle Shaun Smith, but they changed the stat to a pass attempt and completion to himself by Big Ben. They said Big Ben was attempting a pass, hit one of his linemen in the back and then caught the deflection before he was tackled by Smith for a 7-yard loss. It lowered his league high passer rating but he is still in the lead over Kurt Warner. Also included in the Steelers Notebook, Kendall Simmons is expecting his third child soon. His wife is due September 29, but has delivered early with both of his other children. He is hoping she can make it through the weekend, because at that point she would be induced next week and give birth sometime before the next game, Monday night against the Ravens. James Farrior was also fined $7,500 for flipping the bird to the Dawg Pound in Sunday night's game after becoming upset that they were laughing at Ryan Clark's injury.

The Steelers section over at the PG has some other articles for your reading pleasure, including the question of if the Steelers D can fill in Keisel's end spot.

Steelers headlines at the Trib.

Pens headlines at the Trib.

At the last minute, we think we found the video of the Town Hall meeting last night with the Pens. It's 61 minutes and we don't have time to watch it all and it's taking a good amount of time to load so we'll post it here for you to watch. We recommend letting it load and skipping parts you might not have time to watch. Enjoy.

And here is the URL if you prefer that. http://penguins.nhl.tv/team/launch.htm?type=fvod&id=20811&catid=457

We did find where Geno makes his English debut. If you're as excited as us, go to about 34:30. It's quite hilarious, really. Enjoy. :)

Farrior flips bird to Dawg Pound

Sorry for the delay in posts, but we sure hope you all enjoyed the Steelers win over the Browns Sunday night. We unfortunately lost power during the game for a while with all the wind that was blowing from the remnants of hurricane Ike. Somehow, our street seems to be the one that loses power, while others still have it. Although Sunday night we weren't the only ones, we appeared to be the only ones in the general area. Go figure. 

Moving on, James Farrior was one of several players being taunted by Cleveland's "Dawg Pound" before and during the game. When Ryan Clark appeared injured late in the third quarter, some fans decided to cheer, which made Farrior mad and resulted in some exchanging of the middle finger. He'll likely be fined pretty good for that gesture, and we doubt Mike Tomlin will be too happy. To read about that and the other exchanges, click here.

Brett Keisel is going to be out for up to two months with a calf injury. There are no specifics on exactly what it is, but Dan Kreider had a similar injury in 2001 that kept him from playing for more than two months. He was wearing a protective boot from his foot up to his knee yesterday. He will have more tests on it this week.

Ben Roethlisberger does indeed have a low-grade separation in his shoulder and it should be sore for several weeks. Let's hope he's fine and continues to play well even with the sore shoulder.

Ed Bouchette writes on the Steelers' late-game offense with Willie Parker. And also on why the Steelers didn't attempt a field goal late in the game.

If you 'd like a good laugh over a Browns-Steelers' game bet, the head on over to Blog 'n' Gold over at the PG.

In Penguins news, the first on ice practice will be tomorrow at 9 a.m. and is open to the public. It will be a very short training camp because of their trip to Sweden. More Pens news here.

Breaking news: Sidney Crosby got a haircut! Our 100th post! And more!

Yes folks, that's right this is our 100th post and we couldn't be prouder. Actually we could be since we planned so much more than what we've done so far that we just haven't gotten done yet. Like a logo or header of some sort to make our blog look nice and official and some awesome wallpapers for your computer or cell phones. And a lot of other things we've dreamed up. Hopefully we'll get around to some of that soon, but in the mean time we're trying to bring you some of the best news and fun stuff we can find. You'll still love us, right?

In other news, Sidney Crosby got a haircut! Some of you are probably thinking, who cares? We do! That whole long mullet thing was just...getting bad. Kind of like Big Ben back when the Steelers won the Super Bowl. Ewww. And you seriously do not want to see that thing when it's dry or not totally covered with hair product. We caught a glimpse once in a Pens' behind the scenes video and it looks like Gene Simmons' hair. Double ewww. You can check out his new hair and him delivering tickets to some lucky season ticket holders here at KDKA, or here at the Pens' official site. (Is it just us or does Sid look thin? Mainly in the face. Maybe it's the new 'do.) Besides Sidney, Jordan Staal, Marc-Andre Fleury, Pascal Dupuis, Sergei Gonchar, Jeff Taffe, Brooks Orpik, Maxime Talbot, Tyler Kennedy, and Michel Therrien all helped deliver tickets to lucky fans. We were really disappointed to see that Evgeni Malkin didn't participate this year. We loved the video last year of him visiting lucky fans' homes. That accent is amazing and we really wanted to know how his English has progressed. 

In other Crosby news, he's going to be living with the Lemieux's once again this season. He says he's been looking for about a year, but hasn't found a house he's ready for yet. How about build one Sid? You've got the cash, design it yourself!

In Pens news, training camp opens September 16th with the first on-ice practice session Wednesday September 17th at 9:00 am at Mellon Arena. Practices will be open to the public and free of charge. We wish we were close enough to stop by and check out the Pens. If you are, don't miss it. There will be food for sale if that makes it any better for any of you. It would for us. 

Alex Goligoski is a hot item to talk about lately and the PG has an article on him here.

A few days ago this was posted and we read it, but neglected to post it here, so we apologize, but Marc-Andre Fleury is apparently a trendsetter. You all know the story about the change from the yellow pads to the white ones when he returned after his ankle injury. Well now, according to Fluto Shinzawa of the Boston Globe, Tim Thomas, Manny Fernandez and Tuuka Rask are now all sporting white pads. Guess his success in the post-season made some other goalies take notice.

On to the Steelers! Steelers notebook over at the PG says Willie Parker won the AFC offensive player of the week award and Big Ben sits out of practice with a sore shoulder. Big Ben also says of Mario Williams, "That is a big man." The Browns also have lost another starter in cornerback Sean Jones.

Ed Bouchette writes on center Justin Hartwig and the offensive line.

Since it's 4:30 am and we need to get some sleep, we'll leave you with some quick links. Go here to the PG's main Steelers page for other Steelers articles and news. Go here to the Trib's Steelers' headline page. But be sure to check out that the Steelers' worth has risen above one billion dollars according to Forbes magazine and Big Ben won't be sidelined by his sore shoulder.

And last but not least we'll leave you with this bit of information. Chad Johnson/Ocho Cinco will have to pay big bucks to be able to have his new name put on the back of his jersey. As is the usual from the NFL, if a player wants to change his number, or in this case his name, he has to buy the ones that Reebok has already produced. Since it's so close to the start of the season, there is a lot of them. A stock of 100,000 of them to be exact and the cost could reach upwards of $4 million or $50 million pesos. We'll have to wait and see if Chad decides he wants to pay the cash to be Ocho Cinco.

Also today we are remembering those who were lost in the tragedy that was September 11, 2001. We will never forget that day.

Yinz Luv 'Da Stillers

That's right folks, Yinz Luv 'Da Stillers! Confused? Please don't be. Remember Yinz Luv 'Da Guins? You better. That was only the best beginning to a web show ever. Well now they've rolled out Yinz Luv 'Da Stillers. The beginning is almost as good as the ones from YLDG. But beyond the beginning, it's a good web show we wished we would have thought of. Of course video isn't really our thing, but we love the segments like "Most unneeded piece of memorabilia" in the Steelers Forest Face. We have to agree. Yes, that really is in the official Steelers' catalog. And since we decided to find it and link you to it so you could check out this fine piece of tree decor, we found out that it's temporarily out of stock. Why?! Because they only made 10 of them, knowing how stupid this was and 10 people actually bought it? Or are that many people really attracted to that thing that they want to pay $19.95 plus shipping and handling to nail that fine piece of tree decor to a tree in their yard? Only to have some bratty kids tear it down or break it or maybe lightning to strike? Okay okay, we're done. Except, please do click on the picture to enlarge it as it's obviously photoshopped on the tree. Even the catalog people couldn't force themselves to put that thing on a real tree.

While you all cry about the fact that you can't buy a Steelers Forest Face, you should read Blog 'n' Gold over at the PG. They have some good links to motivational posters, the best t-shirt of the week, and more.

Steelers notebook has info on Ben's sore shoulder and other injury updates.

Bob Smizik writes about all the good news but says it's too early to celebrate. We have to agree on this one.

Ed Bouchette writes about the Steelers' special teams play and here's a link to the transcript of his chat on Tuesday. The chats are a great read, don't miss it.

NFL notebook covers Shawne Merriman and his decision to get season ending knee surgery on that left knee with two torn ligaments and Vince Young's issues. We thought Merriman was nuts to even think about playing on a knee with two torn ligaments after being told about 12 million times he needed surgery. And what's with Vince Young? We think he should get some help of some kind, although we're not sure what kind yet. The fact that his family and friends were so concerned about his emotional state that they called the Titans who ultimately called the police to find Young is a little strange. He also doesn't seem to be handling the bad too well so far this season. Which is one game. Which isn't good in our opinion. And he has a knee injury of some sort. Not a great way to start the season.

Big football players have a soft side and like to do beading and crafts. Really. Steelers' rookies went to Children's Hospital and made some kids' day. 

They also change when they have kids. On the field and off.

The Steelers also cut a player and signed another one to the practice squad. They cut receiver  Micah Rucker and signed receiver Martin Nance who was a teammate of Roethlisberger's in college.

You check out the Steelers' news headlines over at the Trib here.

Steelers 1-0

The Steelers got off to a good start against the Texans on Sunday, playing a great game on both sides of the ball. Ben Roethlisberger looked great, as did Willie Parker (what broken leg?). The defense also looked strong, especially James Harrison and new starter LaMarr Woodley. We're excited to see Woodley grow, and if he keeps progressing he should be scary good. He's also a rather large man, we wouldn't want to be the opposing quarterback.

Sunday night the Steelers will take on the Browns in Cleveland for what should be another win. Are we the only ones who enjoy the players introductions where they say the school they came from? 

Ron Cook over at the PG thinks that Ben is the new star quarterback of the NFL now that Brady has gone down for the season (more on that later). Not exactly the best article ever, but Ben is definitely coming into his own in being one of the premier quarterbacks and players in this league. 

Ed Bouchette writes about the defense today and how James Harrison wasn't overly happy with the Steelers' performance against the Texans.

James Farrior also says not to count the Patriots out just yet after losing Tom Brady.

On that Tom Brady thing, what's there to say? We personally can't stand the man and lost a lot of respect for him last year. We respect he's a top quarterback, if not the one at the top of the list, but as a person, we don't have to like him. Do we know him personally? Obviously not. We just don't like his arrogance. We know a lot of people could care less and that's fine, but we don't enjoy praising players or following players who act like arrogant jerks most of the time. Plus there's that whole Patriots spygate thing that we don't have a whole lot of respect for either. But of course, of all times for Tom to go down, it had to be now. We unfortunately were the recipients of a Tom Brady pick in our fantasy draft. Something got messed up and the draft ended up not being live and it was auto-pick. We were last out of 10 and ended up with Tom Brady. Lucky us. And then he has to get hurt. Thank you for that. Basically all we have to say is Grrrrrrrr. Now we don't want anyone to get hurt but Tom Brady being gone for a whole season does mean we don't have to hear announcers have multiple orgasms over Tom and the Pats week after week. We also heard that at least one bar in the Pittsburgh area erupted with cheers when it was shown that Tom Brady was hurt. Now we don't condone that kind of behavior but, who could really blame them?

The Trib has a lot of Steelers coverage too so head on over and check it out. 

Pens' coach Michel Therrien decided to take in some football this weekend. A lot of it. He went to a high school game, Penn State's win over Oregon State, and the Steelers' win over the Texans on Sunday. He got to meet with Mike Tomlin and had also written him a note of best wishes earlier in the week.

Michel Therrien lookin' good!

We should be around, sorry for the delay, we're still under the weather and don't know when things will get better.

HERE WE GO STEELERS, HERE WE GO!

Are you ready for some football? The Steelers' season starts tomorrow at Heinz Field at 1 p.m. We're sure we didn't need to tell you that, or that you should watch, so we'll leave it at that.

Head over to the PG for the best game-day info you can find. Sorry for the lack of posts and information, we're still dealing with some health issues and haven't done much of anything for several days. We're sorry.

Steelers name captains

The Steelers voted yesterday for their captains for this season. Ben Roethlisberger was voted as one of two captains of the offense for the first time, showing he's really becoming a great leader. His co-captain is Hines Ward, who has served as a captain for three years before now. James Farrior is the team's defensive captain for the fifth time in the seven years he's been with the team. Special teams saw a new captain yesterday as well in Jeff Reed. To read about it at the PG, go here. To read about it at the Trib, click here.

Larry Foote has returned to practice with the first team after missing last week with a knee injury. Rashard Mendenhall is no longer carrying a football around with him or handing out cash to his teammates. He's been thinking too much about the fumbles and his teammates just want him to forget all about it. Ward also has a new job in serving as the backup holder on place-kicks to new punter Mitch Berger.

Ed Bouchette writes about Byron Leftwich and how he's embracing his new role as a number 2 quarterback. Also some ideas in this article on how to use Dennis Dixon during the season.

NFL Notebook has some information on how NFL players will be wearing a uniform patch this season to honor the late NFL Players' Association leader, Gene Upshaw who died on August 20th of pancreatic cancer three days after he was diagnosed. The Ravens have also stated that Joe Flacco will start their season opener because he's the healthiest quarterback available.

View from the press box by Scott Brown over at the Trib: Dallas Baker, relaxed but not relaxing.

ESPN covers who they think will be breakout players this year and not surprisingly, Santonio Holmes has been picked as one of them. You can read the article here.

We haven't checked this out fully yet, but ESPN has different blogs for the different divisions in the NFL, so here's a link to the AFC North.

We figured we'd try to throw a few more of those YouTubes in here because, why not? They're fun. So today we thought we'd feature one of the things that Steelers fans love the most, beating the Bungles. Even better than that? Kicking the Bungles out of the playoffs. And guess who did it? That's right, Santonio Holmes. Enjoy.

Steelers add nine to practice squad

The Steelers signed eight players to their practice squad on Sunday, all coming from their training camp roster. They are as follows:

Patrick Bailey, linebacker

Roy Lewis, cornerback/safety

Grant Mason, safety

Jeremy Parquet, offensive tackle

Scott Paxson, nose tackle

Micah Rucker, wide receiver

Dezmond Sherrod, tight end

Justin Vincent, running back

Marvin Allen, wide receiver *

*Joins the practice squad as a ninth player for a second season as part of the NFL's international player development program.

Those additions to the practice squad aren't too surprising to us, glad to see Lewis back for sure. We still hope Mundy gets a shot someday.

Ed Bouchette writes an article today about the Steelers keeping seven defensive linemen, but is concerned about their ages.

NFL Notebook over at the PG. Ricky Williams is back! Let's hope he stays healthy this time. And away from the pot. Or we really don't care.

Guy Junker over at the Trib says the Steelers are still the strongest in their division.

John Harris, also of the Trib, says the Steelers' Fox is finding confidence.

Penguins stuff, yes that's right people, Penguins stuff. Dave Molinari's Q&A is up and running. You can read it here.

USA Today has the Pittsburg Penguins team report. Yes folks, that's correct, the Pittsburg Penguins. We're not sure if they're related to the Pittsburgh Penguins or not, but enjoy it anyway!

Here's a YouTube for you. Remember those random YouTubes of the day? No? We know, it's been too long and we apologize. We really miss hockey, so here's a nice slapshot goal by Sidney Crosby in the NHL 09 demo. Will someone please tell us why we don't have an Xbox 360 or PS3?