Steelers v. Colts in first Click for Cans playoff

Today the Campbell's Chunky Soup Click for Cans playoffs begin. The Steelers (16-1) are matched up against the Colts (14-3) in the first round. If Pittsburgh advances it will play the winner of the Jaguars v. Bills matchup. Click here to vote for the Steelers to beat the Colts.

McCain panders to Steelers' fans

In an interview with KDKA-TV (Pittsburgh) earlier this week, presumptive Republican presidential candidate John McCain told Jon Delano that he invoked the names of Pittsburgh Steelers' defensive linemen when he was a POW in Vietnam in 1967: "When I was first interrogated and really had to give some information because of the pressures, the physical pressures that were on me, I named the starting lineup -- defensive line of the Pittsburgh Steelers -- as my squadron mates."

The problem is that in his 1999 best-selling book "Faith of My Fathers," McCain wrote, "I gave the names of the Green Bay Packers' offensive line, and said they were members of my squadron." Using the names of Packers' players makes more sense; after all, Green Bay was the "Team of the 1960s." Meanwhile, the Steelers were so bad throughout the sixties that even the most diehard Pittsburgh fan couldn't have named the team's defensive linemen without looking them up in a media guide. It wasn't until the following decade that the Steelers developed the "Steel Curtain," which included household names like Mean Joe Greene, Ernie Holmes and Dwight White.

A campaign spokesman called the snafu an "honest mistake," but I'm guessing that McCain was deliberately engaged in some shameless pandering. Knowing that Packers' offensive linemen like Forrest Gregg won't win any votes in Pittsburgh, McCain simply substituted names that would resonate.

Roethlisberger "My Wish" segment to air Sunday

ESPN will air its Akeem Havens/Ben Roethlisberger "My Wish" segment on Sunday morning at 11 a.m. Click here to read our May 30th post about the taping of the program.

An old friend takes orbit

Legendary Steelers broadcaster Myron Copeland always thought the Steelers were out of this world. Now the same can be said of him.

The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reported today the there's a little piece of sky with Copeland's name on it. Actually its a minor planet — distant asteroid 1993 MC — that orbits the sun between Mars and Jupiter.

Officially named 7835 Myroncope in honor of Cope, Dr. Eric Mamajek of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics in Cambridge, Mass. wanted to memorialize the man whose has meant so much to so many Steelers fans.

Too small to be seen by the naked eye, 7835 Myroncope is small and distant — only 3 miles wide and as close as 88 million miles from Earth, although its elliptical orbit can take it as far away as 387 million miles.

Dr. Mamajek said that while there's no chance of Myroncope colliding with Earth, "a direct impact at Cleveland Browns Stadium can perhaps not be ruled out."

I can almost hear Myron cackling.

"Last Team Standing"

For those Steelers (and Eagles) fans interested in early NFL history, the book "Last Team Standing" (Da Capo), by Matthew Algeo, is now available in paperback. At The Steelyard we're not much interested in World War II-era football, but some fans certainly are, so we thought we'd throw it out there. According to the cover jacket the theme of the book is "How the Pittsburgh Steelers & Philadelphia Eagles--'The Steagles'--saved pro football during World War II." How's that for wartime heroism?

Advance word on forthcoming Rooney book

Last week The Steelyard received an advance reading copy of Dan Rooney’s forthcoming book, “My 75 Years With the Pittsburgh Steelers and the NFL” (Da Capo), scheduled to hit stores on November 5. Longtime Steelers’ fans probably won’t glean a whole lot of new information, although there are certainly some interesting bits about past drafts and personnel changes. For instance, concerning the Bill Cowher-Tom Donahoe spat, Rooney writes, “Bill didn’t want Donahoe in the coaches’ meetings because he thought Tom was a spy. Tom thought Bill was finished as an NFL head coach.” Pretty strong words from both sides, don’t you think?

But to me the most interesting item concerns the 2004 draft. Rooney writes that with Eli Manning and Philip Rivers off the board early in the first round “our people seem to have focused on Shawn Andrews, a big offensive tackle from Arkansas as our likely number-one pick…. But when out turn came, I couldn’t bear the thought of passing on another great quarterback prospect the way we had passed on Dan Marino in 1983, so I steered the conversation around to [Ben] Roethlisberger. After some more talk, we came to a consensus and picked Roethlisberger.”

All I can say is, Way to go, Dan! It would have been foolish to take a right tackle over Big Ben, especially since the Steelers were badly in need of a long-term solution at the QB position. I’ve always believed that when a team has a chance to select a potential franchise quarterback it has to seize the opportunity--particularly a team like the Steelers, which rarely has a chance to select in the top 10 of the draft. In my opinion, the Steelers have been too quick to pass on quarterbacks over the years. For instance, back in 2000 the Steelers had the opportunity to trade the 8th overall pick (used to take Plaxico Burress) for two of the Jets’ first-round picks (one of which could have been used on Chad Pennington). Selecting Pennington would have been a worthwhile risk back in the Kordell Stewart era.