Myth #1 - Casey Hampton had a bad game. Inaccurate by all accounts. I'll explain why later.

Myth #2 Justin Hartwig is NOT !!!! an upgrade over Mahan - at least in this preseason. Hartwig is immobile doesn't win the fight up front. He's inefficient at pulling and doesn't seem to fully grasp zone concepts. Sean Mahan at 300lbs early in the season last year is better than Justin Hartwig right now. As Mahan lost weight, his play declined and at 280 lbs he'll never be able to deal with Shaun Rogers or Haloti Ngata. Hartwig isnt that good. I hope for that to change, Kendall Simmons had me fooled last off-season, but I don't feel to bad about it b/c he fooled the front office as well.

Myth #3 Nate Washington sucks - Nate will be, I repeat will be WR3 this year. He is becoming more and more complete in every aspect of his game.

Myth #4 Steelers are in trouble - Its preseason, nothing is ever as it appears

Breaking down the Tape (through 30 minutes of play that involved starters)

Steelers on Offense Keep in mind the Bills are a cover 2 team. They came out in base cover 3 shell nearly every snap with either 8 or 9 men in the box. If that happened in the regular season, Ben would throw 10 TD's against them. The Steelers are looking for film on the RB's and OL and are willingly running into 9 man boxes. We all saw the TD to Santonio. If Buffalo comes out in that base C3/C1 crap and think they could match-up on the perimeter, Santonio scores 4 more of those. The Steelers were successful every time, few times, they attempted to throw down field. It was wide open and with the huge talent levels the Steelers have at the skill positions, we'll see more 7 man boxes. I'm not worried about that at all as we can match weapons with any team in the game.

-Kendall Simmons is the most willing blocker on the team, He fully understands zone concepts and never quits on a play. He is decent at seeking guys out at the 2nd level. His deficiencies are at the point in hat on hat match-ups as he has a slow first step that a quick hard punch will knock off balance. He lacks anchor and I what I think may be core strength or balance.

-Heath Miller is the least willing blocker on the team. 2nd prize goes to Carey Davis. Miller continually gets punked in the run game as I watched a DE cross his face untouched for no gain and saw him pull across the formation with Hartwig on a lead play that neither finished. On that lead play, Marvel missed his seal block on that blew up the play on 'shards sweep, but Miller looked bad. Spaeth, on the other hand, looked pretty good in the run game and hooked up nicely with Ben on the hot read. Carey Davis is incompetent as a lead back and should never be placed in that role. He CANNOT seek the correct man and usually finishes a play without ever really touching anyone. I do like what he does when he has the ball in his hands and could be looked at for short yardage stuff.

-Willie Colon completely erased Chris Kelsay in the run game. He finished nearly every block with an attitude. I came away impressed. His stubby arms are still a concern off short corner in pass pro but on Bens INT to Whitner he tackled Kelsay like an old pro before he got a hand on Ben.

-Kemo/Marvel ....Looked decent, I'm not worried about them.

-Skill positions, pshhhhhhhhhh... we're set. That was just a little taste of the big things you will see from Mewelde Moore this year.

Steelers on Defense Was there a Bill Cowher sighting? The last time the Steelers defense looked like that was 2006. I'm not talking performance or execution, I'm talking play call. The came out in vanilla base Cover 3 just like Buffalo but only out of a 34 front. Most of the time it was Tyrone Carter in the box, a few times Ryan Clark. Troy and his athleticism made that role famous, those two cant pull that off. If you know anything about Cover 3, its 8 in the box with base 2 gap between the OT's and perimeter pressure from your OLB's. The concepts are that it's a better defense against the run, highly susceptible to the pass. The difference between Buf/Pit was that Buffalo came out throwing against it like your're supposed to, the Steelers did not by design.

-Casey Hampton, cut him some slack. His first preseason game. He didn't dominate but did what he's supposed to do in that 2 gap role out of C3. He ate blocks and pushed the pocket 2-3 yards when needed. No news here. He's been in pads for 4 days.

-Aaron Smith, quite possibly his worst game as a pro and I have to question the biceps injury and his strength rehabilitation. He was easily erased on many plays and got zero push from his 5 technique spot or from over the nose where he lined up in quarters.

-Keisel is Keisel. He'll win the Point of Attack and get some pressure but will rarely finish. He had a second QTR sack where he looked strong on a bull rush planting the LG on his back.

-Woodley. Gonna be great as a pass rusher, needs to learn run defense. Specifically contain and backside cutback lanes.

-Larry Foote..I've always been a fan he played terrible. When he switched with Farrior and moved to the buck all the sudden he lost all concept of cutback contain and was continually sucked in. He is still a liability in coverage and I think his performance in this game may have iced LT as the new starter at the mack.

-Secondary. This grade is incomplete until the return of Troy and a proper front 7 call designed to stop an offense. No DB will cover a WR that long. They do need to work on tackling though.