Category: Super Bowl

Two-time SB Champion returns to Pittsburgh in Week 8

Two-time Super Bowl champion and one of the greatest Steelers’ kickers of all-time, Jeff Reed, is attending the Steelers’ Week 8 contest.

Fans of the 2000’s Pittsburgh Steelers rejoice!  Two-time Super Bowl champion, third-all time Steelers’ leading scorer, and one of the greatest kickers in Pittsburgh history, Jeff Reed, is attending his former team’s Week 8 contest against the New York Giants.

Reed belonged to the Super Bowl XL and Super Bowl XLIII championship teams, assisting in bringing the Steelers’ last two Lombardi trophies to Pittsburgh, with 12 points off his right foot in these games.

Reed will follow in the footsteps of former Steelers’ All-Pro players, WR Antonio Brown and RB Le’Veon Bell, who also attended Pittsburgh games this season, as well as making their appearances at the Terrible Tailgate before the game.

 

Pittsburgh has enjoyed having some of the greatest kickers the NFL has ever seen on their rosters, and it is heartwarming to say the least when former Steelers players reunite with their team and fans.

Keep an eye out for Steelers’ legend and two-time Super Bowl kicker Jeff Reed at not only the Terrible Tailgate on October 28th at 3:30 PM EST, but the Monday Night Football game at 8:15 PM EST as well.

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Steelers to wear throwback jerseys in honor of Super Bowl IX 50th anniversary

In Week 7 against the New York Jets, the Pittsburgh Steelers will wear throwback uniforms inspired by their Super Bowl IX win in the 1974 season.

The Pittsburgh Steelers will wear throwback jerseys, inspired by their Super Bowl victory 50 years ago, against the New York Jets in Week 7. Super Bowl IX holds a special place in the hearts of all Pittsburgh fans because it was when the Pittsburgh Steelers earned their first Lombardi Trophy, kicking off a journey to become arguably the greatest NFL franchise of all time. 

The 1974 season not only resulted in winning the greatest trophy in all of professional football, but it was also responsible for perhaps the greatest draft class in Pittsburgh sports history, producing five Pro Football Hall of Famers: WR Lynn Swann, LB Jack Lambert, WR John Stallworth, C Mike Webster and SS Donnie Shell. 

In that Super Bowl, played at Tulane Stadium in New Orleans on Jan. 12, 1975, the Steelers defeated the Minnesota Vikings 16-6. Pittsburgh’s Steel Curtain defense held quarterback Fran Tarkenton and the Vikings to 119 total yards, which is still a Super Bowl record low.

https://twitter.com/steelers/status/1846265288439824434

The beloved block-number-style jerseys are coming back in Week 7, and along with the classic look, gray face masks will also return, which were part of the iconic look of this phenomenal team. The Steelers will look to dominate the Jets in classic Steel Curtain fashion, not only to improve their record to 5-2 on the season but to perform at a level the 1974 Steelers would be proud of.

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Kendrick Lamar announced as Super Bowl LIX halftime performer

Kendrick Lamar will perform at halftime of Super Bowl LIX

The NFL has its music act for halftime of Super Bowl LIX in New Orleans: Kendrick Lamar.

49ers top yet another ESPN roster ranking, highlighting urgency to win Super Bowl

The 49ers win yet another offseason ranking, but it’s hard to care much knowing what the real goal is.

The 49ers Super Bowl window is open. Whether it’s open wide or only a little bit remains to be seen, but it is undeniably there to jump through this season.

Pro Football Focus and ESPN have both touted their roster as the best in the NFL. Now a ranking by ESPN’s Bill Barnwell placed the 49ers WR, TE and RB talent as the best in the league.

It’s better to have good players that put a team out in front of various preseason prognostications. However, this is the fourth time in as many years San Francisco will go into a season with a loaded roster and they don’t have a Super Bowl trophy to show for it. Winning the preseason rankings doesn’t get a banner.

The good news, and perhaps what matters most in the TE, WR, RB rankings, is that the margin for error is wider for quarterback Brock Purdy in his second full season as a starter. He still needs to improve, to be sure, but he’ll have a stellar supporting cast to lean on that should help him overcome some of the inevitable mistakes that come from young signal callers.

Purdy is the key to all of this for the 49ers. What he looks like in the future without this group of playmakers remains to be seen. It also doesn’t matter in the scope of 2024. If he can elevate his game to make a couple more plays with this supporting cast around him, it could mean that this is the year San Francisco finally gets over the hump.

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Chiefs’ Charles Omenihu speaks about not being able to play against the 49ers in Super Bowl

The former 49ers defensive end wasn’t able to suit up for the Super Bowl due to an ACL injury.

In their Super Bowl matchup, the San Francisco 49ers and Kansas City Chiefs had multiple connections on the field with different players who have suited up for both sides during their career.

Charvarious Ward, Jerick McKinnon and Richie James all have walked the sidelines of both the 49ers and the Chiefs. Yet, one former member of the 49ers who now plays for the Chiefs wasn’t able to play in the Super Bowl due to an injury.

Former 49ers defensive end turned Kansas City Chief, Charles Omenihu, missed the Super Bowl with an ACL injury. On Tuesday, Omenihu spoke about missing the Super Bowl against his former team in an interview with Kay Adams on the Up And Adams Show.

I think pregame was the worst — pregame and kickoff. Just seeing everybody warming up. I could feel the atmosphere of being at the Super Bowl. But then you’re on the sideline with nothing around. That was the worst of it all. I was just telling myself ‘hopefully you will be back here and playing.’

It wasn’t good. It wasn’t a good feeling at all. I wanted to play so bad. Especially being my former team last year. I felt like this was my opportunity to show y’all like ‘you didn’t want to pay me.’ Y’all let me go. This is kinda like my opportunity to show y’all that was a horrible decision. And the fact that I wasn’t able to do that against them. I have got over it now, but at that time it very much ate at me.

I saw our schedule came out though and we do have them on the schedule next year. I’m hoping it’s around the time I will be back. I really really want to be available for that game.

Via @UpAndAdamsShow on Twitter:

Omenihu played 11 games with the Chiefs lasts season, racking up 28 tackles and a career-best seven sacks. The former Texas Longhorn played the 2022 season with the 49ers before joining the Chiefs.

This post originally appeared on Niners Wire! Follow us on Facebook and Twitter! 

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Andy Reid offers advice to 49ers head coach Kyle Shanahan

Andy Reid needed 21 seasons to finally win a Super Bowl. He offered some advice to #49ers head coach Kyle Shanahan:

Kyle Shanahan has run into the proverbial wall that stands between NFL head coaches and a Lombardi Trophy four times now in seven seasons as a head coach. Twice he’s fallen short in the Super Bowl. Twice he’s come up short in the NFC championship game. That kind of success without the ultimate prize is a familiar space for Chiefs head coach Andy Reid.

Reid, thanks to his run with quarterback Patrick Mahomes, is now synonymous with greatness among NFL head coaches. There’s a real chance he tracks down former Patriots head coach Bill Belichick as the most decorated head coach of all-time. That wasn’t always the case though.

Prior to Kansas City’s Super Bowl LIV win (over the 49ers, oddly enough), Reid was 20 years deep into his career as a head coach in the NFL. He’d been to just one Super Bowl and lost five NFC championship games between his tenures with the Eagles and Chiefs. Then he got his quarterback and the winning came fast and furious. Since 2019 Reid and the Chiefs have pulled in three Lombardi Trophies and the head coach has established himself as one of the league’s all-time greats.

Reid on Monday at the NFL owners meetings was asked about Shanahan after defeating him in a Super Bowl for the second time in February.

“Just keep doing what you’re doing and somewhere you pop over the hill there,” Reid said via ESPN’s Nick Wagoner. “I know he’s got a great young quarterback, and him with a great young quarterback is deadly.”

Shanahan has had one of the best rosters in the league since his first Super Bowl run as a head coach in the 2019 season, but the QB has always been a little bit of a question mark. Reid is the second Chiefs coach to prop up 49ers QB Brock Purdy as a great player following his performance in Super Bowl LVIII. Defensive coordinator Steve Spagnuolo also did it.

If Reid and Spagnuolo are correct and Shanahan does have his franchise QB in Purdy, then it may not be long until he gets over that hill Reid mentioned. Even if it is Reid and Mahomes standing on top of it.

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Analytics show where 49ers should have kicked off in Super Bowl overtime

The analytics on kicking or receiving the overtime kick in the playoffs (Kyle Shanahan wasn’t wrong to receive… but he also wasn’t right?):

The 49ers’ decision to receive the opening kickoff of overtime in the Super Bowl became a major discussion point after San Francisco’s crushing defeat at the hands of Patrick Mahomes and the Chiefs.

Head coach Kyle Shanahan said after the game the team’s goal with receiving was to control the third possession. In the event the teams were tied after one possession each, the 49ers would then be able to win the game with a field goal.

Of course, it never got to that point because San Francisco kicked a field goal and the Chiefs scored a touchdown to win the game. Perhaps things would’ve gone different had the 49ers done what they usually do when they win the coin toss and took the ball second.

However, Walker Harrison, a quantitative analyst for the New York Yankees, crunched the data on the playoff overtime rules and it turns out there’s no surefire right choice.

Harrison’s numbers show no real advantage either way:

He posted another version with a legend that explains the methodology:

Alas, there are a ton of elements that factor into a coach’s decision. Surely the 49ers’ defense being nearly out of gas by the end of regulation also factored into Shanahan’s decision.

In a results-based business though the decision that led to a loss was the wrong one regardless of what the numbers say. That’s how Shanahan will be judged.

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PODCAST: Super Bowl reactions, new Super Bowl odds, trading for Haason Reddick

Listen as Jess Root and Seth Cox discuss the latest with the Arizona Cardinals.

The Kansas City Chiefs are Super Bowl champions, beating the San Francisco 49ers 25-22 in overtime. In this edition of the podcast, Seth Cox and I react to the game, the ending and the result.

Then we talk about new Super Bowl LIX odds, where the Cardinals stand and then discuss Eagles linebacker Haason Reddick and how he is available to trade for.

Should the Cardinals bring back their former first-round pick?

Enjoy the show with the embedded player above or by subscribing to the show on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform, so you never miss a show. Make sure as well to give it a five-star rating!

Times and topics:

(1:00) Reactions to Super Bowl LVIII

(41:33) Super Bowl LIX odds and the Cardinals

(54:02) Should the Cardinals trade for Haason Reddick?

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Zulgad: Vikings shouldn’t be scared of losing Kirk Cousins, even if they have to turn to bridge quarterback

Judd Zulgad explains why the Minnesota Vikings shouldn’t be scared to lose Kirk Cousins because of a bridge quarterback like Sam Darnold.

The Minnesota Vikings have avoided quarterback tumult since signing Kirk Cousins as a free agent in March 2018. This isn’t to say Cousins hasn’t been a polarizing figure among fans, but there was no uncertainty about who would be starting at quarterback for the Vikings until Cousins suffered an Achilles injury in late October.

It appears that stability is about to come to an end.

The NFL season concluded on Sunday with the Kansas City Chiefs’ overtime win against San Francisco in the Super Bowl, and that means the offseason frenzy is about to begin. The new league year will begin a month from Tuesday, and Cousins is expected to be one of the most pursued free agents on the market.

The Vikings reportedly are interested in bringing back Cousins, but it seems they want it to be on their terms. Last March, the two sides couldn’t come to an agreement on an extension, in part because the Vikings reportedly wanted a shorter-term deal than what the Cousins camp was pursuing. It was agreed talks would be shelved until the offseason. But the closer Cousins gets to free agency, the more likely it becomes that a guy who turns 36 in August is going to see what the market has to offer.

The hope has to be that the Vikings have spent the past 11 months preparing for life after Cousins. The 2023 season helped his cause in part because his absence resulted in the Vikings playing three backups (Josh Dobbs, Jaren Hall and Nick Mullens) who couldn’t take hold of the job. But the Vikings’ 3-6 record also put on display many other shortcomings that need fixing.

Super Bowl week is the perfect place for rumors and rumblings to be bandied about, and Tom Pelissero of NFL Network linked the Vikings to San Francisco backup Sam Darnold.

This resulted in some not-so-favorable reactions. Darnold spent three seasons with the New York Jets after being the No. 3 pick in the 2018 draft. He had a two-year stop in Carolina and was Brock Purdy’s backup with the 49ers this season.

Is Darnold a name that should excite fans? No. What needs to be remembered is that Darnold would be a bridge to a QB the Vikings are likely to draft this April. That could be Michigan’s J.J. McCarthy or Washington’s Michael Penix Jr. The Vikings also could trade into the top of the draft and grab North Carolina’s Drake Maye or LSU’s Jayden Daniels.

Watching the Chiefs and 49ers on Sunday, it became clear just how far the Vikings are from competing at that level in the playoffs. Minnesota general manager Kwesi Adofo-Mensah needs to improve several areas of his team, especially on defense, and overall the Vikings need far more quality depth than they currently have.

This isn’t the time to run things back, but rather to move on from veterans and hit a reset that will set up the Vikings for the future. Cousins was brought to Minnesota in 2018 because he was considered the final piece of what the Vikings thought was a Super Bowl puzzle. That team was coming off a loss at Philadelphia in the NFC title game and wanted to upgrade from a backup who had a career year, Case Keenum, to a long-term replacement.

Cousins proved to be exactly that — the season-ending Achilles injury marked the first time in his nine years as a starter he missed time because of injury — but he fell well short when it came to being the final piece of a Super Bowl puzzle. The Vikings missed the postseason in 2018 and made only two playoff appearances in Cousins’ six seasons. They won one game.

Cousins deserves the opportunity to get one more big contract in free agency and go to a team that believes the same thing the Vikings did in 2018 — that it is on the verge of hoisting a Lombardi Trophy.

Maybe Cousins will surprise us and decide he likes Minnesota so much that he will stay on a short-term, discount deal that will put him in a position to start for one more season and, just as importantly, serve as a mentor to a guy like McCarthy.

That, however, seems like a long shot, and the Vikings have to know it.

That puts the Vikings in a position to pursue Darnold or Jacoby Brissett or Gardner Minshew and draft the future starter. ESPN’s Dan Graziano reported over the weekend that the New England Patriots may be open to trading the third overall pick and that the Vikings and Falcons were teams to “keep an eye on” as far as potential trade partners.

Graziano also reported that some in the Vikings organization liked the idea of moving up and trying to get Daniels to pair with another LSU alum, wide receiver Justin Jefferson. Of course, if the Vikings get Maye or Daniels, odds are good he will be the Week 1 starter and the bridge quarterback will be there only in case of emergency.

While there is risk in taking this route, the Vikings are in the ideal position to do it. If it backfires, that could cost Adofo-Mensah and Kevin O’Connell their jobs. If the Vikings bring back Cousins at a significant price tag and keep running it back, both the GM and coach are likely to be shown the door sooner rather than later.

Judd Zulgad is co-host of the Purple Daily Podcast and Mackey & Judd podcast at www.skornorth.com.

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