Pittsburgh Steelers linebacker Lawrence Timmons has been getting a lot of heat in the early portion of the 2012 NFL season for not generating enough big plays.
On Sunday afternoon against the Philadelphia Eagles, Timmons finally stepped up in an obvious way that made people take notice. The sixth-year man out of Florida State reminded folks why the Steelers gave him a nice contract extension last year.
On the day, Timmons collected nine tackles including a variety of big stops in the run game. Neal Coolong does a nice job of summing up his performance over at Behind The Steel Curtain:
Heading into Week 5, Timmons had 12 total tackles. At the final buzzer, he had nine tackles -- eight solo -- in Week 5 alone. This doesn't speak of the slew of pressure he generated. There was a stretch in the first half where he had a forced fumble and recovery, a tackle for loss and a pressure. All of those plays came on second down, and of the two where the Eagles retained the ball, it set up third-and-long situations.
It will be interesting to see if Timmons can keep his level of play high on Thursday night against the Tennessee Titans.