By Aubrey Bruce, For New Pittsburgh Courier
The late great comic genius Richard Pryor once described many so-called Christian ministries as “marketing machines.” He once said this: “Hello there, friends and neighbors, has God touched you today? If he hasn’t, send us some money and we will send you a genuine touch from God.”
It appears to yours truly that not only will the Pittsburgh Steelers need a mere touch from the almighty, but they are also going to require an armed personal escort from him or her just to record a 9-8 win-loss record this season. I’ll bet the last cigar of late comedian George Burns that when Steelers Head Coach Mike McCarthy posts such a genuinely generic record, they will pine, whine, and lap up and shed tears into all of the available carafes of wine saying that the financial demands of former Steelers cornerback Joey Porter Jr. did not hide his “need for greed.” Also, Porter Jr. supposedly did not disguise his effort in helping to cause the eventual demise of the Pittsburgh Steelers.
Also, some of the recent deals negotiated by Genghis Khan and the remainder of the black and gold Mongols have been less than stellar. In my opinion, the Mongols may have consumed too much gin and juice before sitting down at the negotiating table. It appears that when it comes to dealing with the Pittsburgh Steelers, the owner of the Dallas Cowboys, the dishonorable Jerry Jones, may have called in one of his top guns from Transylvania, Vlad III, “Big Vlad” or Vlad Draculea. Many of the deals made for a few of the Steelers’ top young draft picks were at the very least, “cartoonish.” However, don’t get it twisted, the cartoon characters, “Tom and Jerry,” may be harmless. However, “Vlad and Jerry,” maybe not so much, when it comes to the success or failure of the Pittsburgh Steelers football club.
The “yinzer juice and ginzers” are morphing into ultra-crybabies pouting with their big fat thumbs in their mouths crying: “Wah wah, mommy, mommy, I didn’t mean to cause the puppy to get sick. I only fed him rocks and gravel because I couldn’t find the dog food sitting on top the dishwasher.”
A few of the local Maga-ite scribes are now pulling out the honor after you’re gone card. Ya know, the card that is sorta relative to the posthumous honorarium held for an honoree after they have received their one-way ticket from the undertaker-in-charge to the bone orchard.
To confirm my opinion, one such story was posted by Allison Koehler: “Aaron Rodgers honors Mike Tomlin with a fitting T-shirt after Steelers’ win.” Koehler writes: “Aaron Rodgers honored former Pittsburgh Steelers head coach Mike Tomlin after Sunday’s 34-22 win over the Indianapolis Colts, wearing a black T-shirt with DGBTTF across the front and a Coach T logo underneath. Rodgers played for Tomlin during the coach’s final Pittsburgh season in 2025. Tomlin stepped down in January before Mike McCarthy took over. One season together was enough for a familiar defensive reminder to stick with his quarterback. ESPN’s Brooke Pryor attempted to make it something more than it was, asking Rodgers whether the shirt was a coincidence or a warning to a Colts defense that had let Jaylen Warren beat it to the flat a couple of times. Rodgers kept the explanation simple, which suited a small, affectionate gesture.”
“Brooke Pryor attempted to make it something more than it was, asking Rodgers whether the shirt was a coincidence…” It seems as if Pryor may be at her old tricks again because when it comes to defining ex-Pittsburgh Steelers Head Coach Mike Tomlin, many local writers continue to perpetrate the fraudulent opinion that Tomlin was nothing more than an average football coach who was too Black and overpaid and was only employed because he was accompanied by the “God of the EEOC.” Remember when almost 90 percent of the Pittsburgh sports beat reporters and radio hosts tied a rope around the wrists of Mike Tomlin in a failed coup to drag Tomlin back into the college football coaching ranks?
Jelani Scott posted this next story on sportsillustrated.com on Jan 15, 2024. I am going to bring you a few excerpts from that article. She writes: “Remember Tomlin, the Steelers coach since 2007, took the podium for his usual post-game media session following Pittsburgh’s 31–17 loss to the Buffalo Bills. The proceedings took a sudden turn, however, after Tomlin fielded a question from ESPN’s Brooke Pryor that began with the reporter saying, ‘Mike you have a year left on your contract…”
I am puzzled and pissed when coaches like Kevin Stefanski, who has a 1-2 playoff game record as a head coach, are elected as coach of the year in the NFL, not once but twice. He first won the award in 2020, and then again in 2023. As of now, Kevin Stefanski has a 47-58 regular season record as an NFL head coach, giving him a winning percentage of about 45 percent. They didn’t attempt to downgrade him to the college ranks. In the recent past, many yinzers laughed and described the move as a big joke when the Cleveland Browns grabbed quarterback DeShaun Watson from the open market openly smirking and saying he was washed up. Maybe Aaron Rodgers should be the one hanging on the clothesline? It seems that the only athletes whose compensation is not regularly debated are White athletes.
Brogan Clasper recently posted a story: “He’s washed—Skip Bayless does not hold back in his thoughts on Aaron Rodgers.” Brogan writes: “Skip Bayless has seen enough of Rodgers over the years to now form his opinion on where he feels the 42-year-old’s game is at. Bayless shared his true thoughts on Rodgers. ‘He’s washed. He’s done. Washed, gone, over and out,’ said Bayless. ‘That game that he played against the Texans, that home playoff game, was bad. He’s just lost his nerve. He’s lost too much athletic ability and mobility, and he can still fling it and wing it. I know you [Shannon Sharpe] love his style. Yeah, he’s got the greatest quarterback style we’ve ever seen. Just the way it looks when he throws the ball, he flicks it. Okay, but he’s lost some velocity.'”
OK Skip, that may be true. But with Aaron Rodgers or Mason Rudolph at the helm, the 2026 Pittsburgh Steelers may be the ones that are truly going to be the ones that are done, even if he has the greatest quarterback style we’ve ever seen.
