Steelers feasted on spoils of super bowl win, lost their hunger

[BlitzburghRockCity]

http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/06332/741753-66.stm


By Ed Bouchette, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette


The Steelers acted this year as do many Powerball winners: They celebrated their good fortune, then went out and blew all of it.

There are as many theories about what happened to the 2006 Steelers as there are sacks of Ben Roethlisberger. The assumptions target coaching, the quarterback, the line, the pass rush, the turnovers, injuries, motorcycles, bad luck, the Campbell's Soup commercial jinx, the "cheap" owners, NFL schedule makers and that $2.5 million home in Raleigh, N.C.

It may be something that on one hand is much simpler and on the other far more complicated. It may be that the Steelers enjoyed being Super Bowl champions so much after coming close for so many years that they just forgot what it took for them to win it. One veteran player recently described it as "overconfidence."

And here is what Deion Sanders, former Super Bowl winner, said about the Steelers this week on the NFL Network:

"You have to understand when you win the Super Bowl you can't just mosey into town because everyone knows you're coming. They can't handle their success."

That would fall in the realm of human nature. It's why writers have one best seller and can't reproduce it, or rock groups become one-hit wonders, why there are few duplicate Nobel Prize or Pulitzer Prize winners. It's a reason Super Bowl victors rarely repeat. Not only is it difficult to do, but once you've done it, you have "arrived."

As one member of the 2006 Steelers said, even if they have a losing season, they cannot take the Vince Lombardi Trophy away from them. If you had asked each member of the 2005 Steelers if they would accept a losing season in 2006 to win the Super Bowl in 2005, each would make that deal. It does not mean they had to have a poor 2006 season, but it is a way of explaining it.

Willie Parker said it after the Steelers fell to 2-6, that they weren't as hungry this season as they were last. Again, that's human nature; it's tough to stay hungry when your appetite has just been sated.

Somehow, Bill Belichick and the New England Patriots found a way to stay hungry, but those around the 2002 Patriots will say they acted very much like the 2006 Steelers; they were full of their first Super Bowl victory from the previous year.

We all knew the super bowl hangover was a possibility but I don't think any of thought it would have turned out this way, not by any stretch of the imagination.

[Steelersfan]

Well you would have thought that losing so many games already it would have sparked something, anything. Instead they come out with the season basically on the line and lay the biggest dud I have ever seen from a Steelers team.
How can you not know that every team you play is going to come after you? You are the champs and everyone wants to beat the champs.

[SteelersWoman]

You're right TG.

I would dare say that if anyone had asked a Steelers fan at the beginnin of the season if it was even possible for our guys to be doin so badly at this point, not a one of us would've said "it's possible".

Some of us might have agreed that it was possible we wouldn't go to the Super Bowl again this year, but I think most of us would have figured at the very least we'd make it to the playoffs.

It's just so hard (even painful) to seem them doin so badly and strugglin so after the season they had last year, but I still love 'em.

[BlitzburghRockCity]

You would think every super bowl winner would look back at the past and see how those winners previously did the next year and say to themselves "we aren't going to let up" . Yet this team just sat on its laurels and figured they could just show up and turn it on when they had too...yeah how well did that work out for us ! :banging:

[AZ_Steeler]

With BC as the coach I never expected this team to come out this season and perform as they have done so far. SF nailed this one because you would think after losing some games something would have sparked!!

BC usually has the team focused and ready to go every year but the SB obviously got to him as well, plus the house :dunno: PFT actually went to the Steelers training camp and wrote an article about it and at the time I kind of just brushed it to the side because after all it was PFT.... Any how, they said players were sitting on their helmets having a good ole time and the practices were really laid back. :dunno: I guess they were right...

[BlitzburghRockCity]

We've all seen the Steelers in the past basically just expect to show up and win after having some success and then they're brought back down to earth by a team they should beat and then they usually get refocused after a game or too...but this team has never seen this much success to such a high degree as last season. They just weren't ready to handle it plain and simple. Im sure BC preached and preached that this is a new year and its going to be harder than ever, etc. but this team obviously didn't take it to heart.

Yes you would have thought after the first few losses that something would have clicked inside that "hey, we still need to actually play to win" , but alas they've dug themselves a hole so deep there's nothing left to do but go up for as much time as we have left.