Feb 15, 2020 5 min read

Myles Garrett was reinstated from his “indefinite” suspension last week and immediately went on ESPN and again claimed that Mason Rudolph used a racial slur against him.

Wonder why, in the four months Garrett has had since the incident took place Nov. 14, he didn’t double down on his claims against Rudolph again, waiting until the day after his suspension was lifted to do so?

The NFL investigated the incident, which allegedly took place during the brawl between the Steelers and Browns at the end of Cleveland’s 21-7 win and found no evidence Rudolph used any kind of slur toward Garrett.

And for his part, Garrett didn’t make that claim until nearly a week later, when he went to an appeals hearing for his suspension for ripping the helmet off Rudolph and then hitting the quarterback in the head with it.

Rudolph said he had not used any kind of slur toward Garrett and his teammates, several of whom were nearby when the event allegedly took place, have backed him up on that.

But that doesn’t fit Garrett’s narrative. He wants an excuse for his ridiculous behavior.

The fact he waited until after his suspension was lifted to make the allegation again shows he’s still trying to excuse that away.

• Steelers general manager Kevin Colbert said last week the team is optimistic Ben Roethlisberger will return and play at a high level in 2020.

The Steelers might not even need that. Eighty percent of Roethlisberger could be good enough to make the Steelers a Super Bowl contender in 2020.

The Steelers are 120-21 in games in which Roethlisberger started and the opponent has scored 21 or fewer points. In 2019, the Steelers had 10 games when they held the opposing team to 21 or fewer points on their way to allowing an average of 18.9 points per game, the fifth fewest in the NFL.

And that was with their quarterbacks throwing 20 interceptions.

Helping that defense out just a little bit by possessing the football longer – the Steelers ran nearly 100 fewer offensive plays than their opponents in 2019 – will go a long way.

• The Pirates signed center fielder Jarrod Dyson this week to replace Starling Marte and he immediately endeared himself to fans.

When asked what it was that interested him in signing with the Pirates, Dyson replied, “Ain’t too much out there right now. You would love to explore, but at the same time, you’ve got to take what you can, take the good with the bad and roll with it. Make the most of it.”

What a ringing endorsement.

Dyson, by the way, is a career .249 hitter who batted .230 last year in 130 games with the Arizona Diamondbacks. That came on the heels of batting .189 in 2018.

What, did he think the New York Yankees were going to come calling?

Ah, nothing like pitchers and catchers reporting to get players to say something stupid.

• You’ll excuse the Pirates if they don’t use “Pittsburgh Pirates 2020, Make the Most of it,” as their slogan.
• Was there a worse night in local major college basketball history than what took place Wednesday in Morgantown, W.Va., and Pittsburgh?

West Virginia took a 41-32 lead against No. 3 Kansas with just over 13 minutes to play and was outscored 26-8 the remainder of the game in a 58-49 loss.

It was just the sixth loss of the season for the 14th-ranked Mountaineers, but second in a row and just a heartbreaker to lose at home.

Not to be outdone, Pitt, coming off a win over Georgia Tech, was looking to get to .500 in the ACC against a mediocre Clemson team at the Peterson Events Center and on head coach Jeff Capel’s birthday.

They were beaten by 20 points in a game that wasn’t that close.

It seems the Mountaineers don’t know how to handle success and the Panthers can’t figure out how to even get to the point where they blow a lead against a top-ranked opponent.

• The way Penguins general manager Jim Rutherford is going, the Penguins won’t have another first-round draft pick until 2025 or so.

Normally, that wouldn’t matter, but considering the team’s stars are mostly on the wrong side of 30, at some point, Rutherford might want to keep a first-round pick instead of shipping it away.

Maybe Jason Zucker will help this team win a Stanley Cup. If that’s the case, sending the first-round pick to Minnesota for Zucker, who was playing on the Wild’s fourth line, will have been a good move.

But if it doesn’t work out, it will just be another year in which the Penguins don’t have a first-round draft pick to replenish their roster.

Maybe I’m just being too cynical, but Zucker’s 14 goals don’t scream to me that he was a must-have player.