As the Pittsburgh Steelers get ready to take on the Buffalo Bills tonight, this game will be about as close to a regular season game as you will get from the Steelers. Coach Tomlin said most starters will play at least a half, maybe even more. As we count down the days till Week 1, here are some of the players you need to keep an eye on tonight.
Max Starks- The Steelers have had offensive line issues for years. As much turmoil the line has experienced, one main stay has been Max Starks. He can’t seem to stay away, with the Steelers resigning him the last two seasons. Mike Adams has been seen as the eventual starter, but he continues to make rookie mistakes, which is understandable.
It looks all but certain that Starks will be the starter, keeping that job since he became the starter in week 5 last season.
He had a knee injury which he is still healing from, so it will be important to see if he is still solid and able to hold down the left tackle position.
Heath Miller- The one player Todd Haley talked about in his introductory press conference was Heath Miller. He is a huge fan of him and looks to use him a lot. The last two preseason games we have seen just as much of Heath Miller as we have seen the Ravens in the Superbowl, once. He made a nice block for Antonio Brown to score his touchdown against the colts. You would expect to have seen more, but we haven’t. I believe this is to try and hide their plan to use Heath. It was also reported that they would show a lot more of the offense tonight, so we will have to see how much Miller is apart of the game plan.
Chris Carter- James Harrison is getting up there in age. With age comes injury. Harrison has not slowed down on the field, but he has had troubles it’s his knees, and back. He had surgery this past week and he will be lucky to play in Denver. This means we have a big void at Outside Linebacker. Even if Harrison plays a lot this year, there is a good chance he might retire. We need a long term solution, in steps Chris Carter. A fifth round pick out of Fresno State, Carter has been the starting outside backer opposite Woodley this whole preseason. Jason Worilds, the other backup outside linebacker, is on the PUP list with a broken hand. carter has looked solid, so it will be interesting to see if he can continue to progress and hopefully fill in well for Harrison.
There are countless other players I will be looking at, but these men are the most heavily under my microscope.
-Nick Kelly
Follow me on Twitter @Nickthesteelman
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