Heavy-hearted Steelers wrap up camp
The unofficial credo as part of the Pittsburgh Steelers coaching staff for Darryl Drake this season was, “Shut out the noise,” quarterback Ben Roethlisberger relayed as training camp wrapped up Thursday.
Drake perhaps was tacitly referring to some of the offseason off-field drama surrounding the Steelers, much of it in the wake of his star pupil, Antonio Brown, engineering a trade out of town.
But after Drake was found dead in his Saint Vincent College dormitory room early Sunday morning, “Shut out the noise” could in some small way be applied to the grief the Steelers are feeling as they head back to work preparing for the season.
“It’s hard to get back to the game you love because he’s not out there telling you what to do, he’s not out there yelling,” Steelers receiver Ryan Switzer said. “So it’s hard – but it’s part of our profession, and it’s something we have to do. And something that coach Drake would want us to do. Quite frankly, he’d be (ticked) at me right now for taking it as a hard as we are.”
Switzer repeatedly stopped to compose himself and multiple times appeared to hold back tears during a threeminute session of speaking to reporters Thursday, the first time he felt able to do so since Drake’s death.
The team attended a memorial Tuesday evening for the longtime NFL and college position coach who joined the Steelers prior to last season. Drake, who was 62, was beginning his 16th consecutive season as an NFL wide receivers coach.
His death hit many of the Steelers receivers hard.
“Coach Drake always called us his sons,” Switzer said. “He didn’t have any boys; he always called us his sons.”
Drake, who had three daughters, quickly made an impression with the Steelers that extended beyond the wide receivers’ room.
“I think in that year and a half he meant more to me than some people that I’ve known for my whole life,” Roethlisberger said. “I know he was an amazing football coach – but he was an even better man, a better husband, better father, and a better man of God than he was a football coach.”
As the team’s oldest and longest-tenured member and co-captain, Roethlisberger strived to be a source of comfort to younger players who worked more closely with Drake.
“Sometimes, the best thing you can do for grief is to listen,” Roethlisberger said.
Newton to play: Cam Newton is expected to see his first game action since Dec. 17 when the Carolina Panthers host the Buffalo Bills on Friday night.
Newton, the league MVP in 2015, missed the final two games of last season and underwent arthroscopic surgery on his right shoulder in January. He and Carolina’s other starters did not play in the first preseason game against the Bears.
Bears unlikely to use starters: Chicago Bears coach Matt Nagy continued to keep quiet on how much the starters will play on the road against the New York Giants on Friday night, but all indications are little or not at all even if they’re obviously tired of hitting each other and want to hit someone else.
They went through a two-hour-plus mock game Wednesday night, complete with pumped-in stadium noise, light hitting, a clock and starters facing backups.
Kyle Long got into a fight, removed the helmet of rookie defensive lineman Jalen Dalton and began swinging it at defenders before being sent to the bench for the night. It was their third straight practice with a fight of some sort.
Mitchell Trubisky and the starting offense played only three snaps and handed off three times in last week’s preseason opener, a 23-13 loss to Carolina.