Distractions may have doomed Steelers Do Emploi Plein temps

Football is a game of high Neil Walker Jersey emotion. It requires a unique focus and, as the saying goes, is the ultimate team sport, where interdependence and cohesion are always at a premium. Thinking back on what was a wild and unpredictable Week 3 one where the quality of offensive play around the league finally rose to a level we've come to expect from the NFL four of the most shocking outcomes may have had at least something to do with circumstance.I'm not out to make excuses for what the , , Bucs and put on film on Sunday, and this not an attempt to minimize how poorly those teams performed. It's also not in any way a knock on what the , , and accomplished in overrunning their respective opponents. But after reflecting on all four outcomes and talking to some execs around the league and scouts who reviewed the film of some of these teams, I do believe that all four were impacted at least to some degree by i sues outside of the scope of football itself and fell prey to ancillary factors in some cases outside of their own control and in others very much of their own making.All are now in a position where they need to shake off those dismal showings and get back to the matter of establishing themselves as a quality football team, and time will tell if in fact these were blips for these clubs or if they were a portal into deeper, football-related shortcomings that will continue to get exposed as the season goes on. For now, I'm inclined to give them the benefit of the doubt.I wrote at length on Sunday about how out of sorts the Steelers were, how their botched attempt to manage the ongoing Anthem protests backfired badly and actually led to them appearing to be a team divided, with just four coaches on the sidelines, the rest of the coaches in the tunnel with most of the players, but with the player most, unfairly, caught up in the pre-game controversy, decorated Army veteran , somehow finding himself all alone at the end of the tunnel from the visitor's locker room to the field at Solider Stadium. And they played like a team that had spent too much time over-thinking how to devise a response, rather than letting grown men opt to kneel or sit or stand on a sideline for 90 seconds while "The Star Spangled Banner," was sung. And now, with this situation festering throughout Kyle Barraclough Jersey the locker room and team headquarters and players and coaches still trying to addre s and explain those poor optics from Sunday, the Steelers will go into this week's game, at rival Baltimore, with another awkward subplot at play. I'm not saying the Bears dictated that game and grabbed an early lead and led most of the day and ran the ball down 's throat and bottled up that offense because of the way the Steelers handled the pre-game stuff but I am saying clearly these players had lots on their minds and many were miffed about the way the Anthem played out in Chicago.The Ravens had never dealt with the protest situation much before and, playing in London in the earliest kickoff po sible, they too seem thrown off about how to handle it. Waiting until Thursday night to fly to London was a mistake in hindsight, their weekend Jeff Locke Jersey quickly got away from them needing to meet league responsibilities in London and then having to sort out the aftermath of Donald Trump's diatribe against NFL players. Already in a time crunch, Baltimore looked evert but un-prepared to play against Jacksonville, which makes an annual trip to London and took everything in stride. None of this in any way lets the Ravens off the hook for what might be the worst showing in franchise history a 44-7 defeat that actually somehow looked even more lopsided than that but I also a sert that logistics and planning and being unaccustomed to their surroundings played a role in it. Should it have at this level? Probably not. But their minds, like the Steelers' seemed elsewhere and now both of these teams have something to prove this Sunday.The Dolphins and were dealing with a much more visceral and physical challenge. Their seasons were disrupted by the hurricanes that ripped through Florida in Week 1. They lost their bye weeks and had last-minute, Week 1 byes foisted upon them, and scrambled to find safety for their families in Carolina or California. They lost precious practice time and had real concerns to tend to outside of football, and then both came out with a purpose in Week 2, winning convincingly But then there was more travel in Week 3 especially for Miami and that lost practice time can catch up with you, and there is le s adrenaline after the opener and these players returned home the week before to try to sort out property damage and help in their communities. So, I don't think it's a total coincidence that both lacked that same fire and crispne s in Week 3 and were run off the field. Tampa faced a tough chore all along in going to Minnesota, where the Vikings can play some defense, but to get carved up like they did by back-up QB was a surprise. And the Dolphins came this close to getting shutout in New Jersey by a Jets team some had picked to go 0-16."You could see right away the Dolphins didn't have their Blank Jersey legs," said one veteran scout. "It all caught up with them. The storm, the travel. They haven't had a real home game since last season. You could tell they weren't right. You can't just throw that game out, but you can understand it. Same thing with Tampa. It isn't always just about football."Unfortunately for Miami, their trek only gets more daunting, turning around to have to "host" the in London is no small order, then it has to go to Nashville to play the stout before finally playing at home in Week 5. Tampa hosts a desperate team still looking for its first win. I suspect we see better football from this group overall, and I imagine at least one or two end up in the postseason despite those Week 3 showings, but they can't let things snowball, either. Sacks are in, blocking is outNext to the protests, the grotesque state of many offensive lines has been a prevalent running theme this season. And the natural corollary to that could Cameron Maybin Jersey be a record number of players topping 20 sacks. Your eyes are not deceiving you, a quarterback really is being crushed, somewhere in America, on like every other play.Here are the NFL sack totals, through three weeks, each of the last four seasons:2017: 239 4.98 per game2016: 206 4.29 per game2015: 195 4.06 per game2014: 192 4.0 per game.That's kind of staggering to me. Sacks are up 1 per game since 2014. They are up 80 percent in a four-year span. Now, I'll grant you that in 2013, we'd absorbed 258 sacks already through Week 3, so it could always be worse. But I also went back 10 seasons as well, and in 2007 there had been 209 sacks through three weeks acro s the NFL. Go back to 1997, and it's 220 sacks through three weeks. So clearly, we're not in a great space for quarterbacks. And sacks,