Steelers, Lions wrap up joint practices
Antonio Brown just might be the baddest wide receiver on the planet.
Wednesday night at the Steelers’ joint practice with the Detroit Lions, he was just a bad boy.
Brown verbally dressed down NFL officials that were present at the practice, constantly calling for penalty flags to be thrown on plays, many times with words not fit for print. And when back judge Perry Paganelli had heard enough, he told Brown, “If this was a game, you’d be gone.”
Under the new league rules this season, if a player draws two unsportsmanlike conduct penalties in a game, he is ejected. Pagnelli obviously felt that Brown had crossed a line, not once, but twice.
• The intensity level, obviously, picked up on the second day of joint practices between the Lions and Steelers.
Tempers also flared a couple of times.
First, running back Fitzgerald Toussaint didn’t appreciate being knocked down from behind on one play and got up to go face to face with the offending defensive back. That caused former Bengals player Wallace Gilberry, now with Detroit, to come in and start jawing with Toussaint as well before they were pulled apart.
Later, Le’Veon Bell and linebacker Josh Bynes got physical after another play. The two went facemask to facemask before Bell smacked Bynes in the mask, causing a scrum that was quickly broken up.
Both were minor incidents, however, in an otherwise spirited session that included some backs on backers, third down and two-minute drill work.
Pittsburgh’s linebackers dominated Detroit’s running backs and tight ends in the backs on backers winning 16 of the 23 reps. Though the Lions were without their top two tight ends and top runner Ameer Abdullah, the Steelers were without starting outside linebackers Bud Dupree and Jarvis Jones, both of whom were out Wednesday, and James Harrison, who did not participate in the drill.
That didn’t stop linebacker after linebacker from just bulling through the Detroit players and into the quarterback.
At one point toward the end of the drill, running back Zach Zenner stepped up for Detroit. And when no Steelers backer immediately stepped in, one of the Lions said, “They don’t want none of this.”
That elicited a response of, “Oh yeah they do,” from outside linebackers coach Joey Porter.
Tyler Matakevich stepped in and used his spin move to roll through the dummy quarterback.
On the other field, Pittsburgh’s offensive players went 13-12 in the drill, which is tilted toward the defense.
• In third down plays, the Steelers offense converted 7 of 15 attempts with all four quarterbacks getting work.
• I have praised Sammie Coates several times for the solid hands he had displayed in this camp. I might have spoken too soon. Coates had a rough day Wednesday either dropping or having four passes knocked out of his hands by Detroit defenders.
• The first-team offense working against Detroit’s first-team defense had an rough start to a drive from its own 20.
Ben Roethlisberger overthrew Jesse James on a quick pass over the middle and it was picked off by Rafael Bush and returned for a score.
• With Markus Wheaton continuing to sit out, Eli Rogers is really showing up again and again as the slot receiver.
Roethlisberger looked Rogers’ way early and often in many of the team drills and the 5-10, 187-pound receiver was consistently open on crossing routes and quick slants.
• Sean Davis shut things down early today and was icing his left knee. He also did so last Friday in the night practice, so I don’t think it’s a big deal.
He was replaced by Montell Garner as the nickel corner. Garner, from South Alabama, has impressed at times in this camp. He told me after practice that the Steelers scouted him in college and liked him but he signed with the Rams as an undrafted free agent.
The Rams cut him at the end of camp and he was getting ready to join the Arena Football League when the Steelers called him for a tryout at the end of the season.