James Conner gets destroyed by teammates for posting corny Instagram photo

James Conner getting dunked on by his Steelers teammates is both funny and a reason why they’re so dang good. 

Life is good for Pittsburgh Steelers running back James Conner. After a rough Week 1 in which his night ended early due to injuries, it appears that he’s back on track as the top guy in the Steelers backfield.

It’s not just Conner that life is good for, the Steelers overall are off to a hot start and sit among the undefeated teams pulling the puppet strings in their respective conferences through the first three weeks. Sunday saw Pittsburgh come from behind to beat the Houston Texans, a feat made impressive by the fact that the Steelers shut their opponent out in the second half.

Conner specifically seems to embody the Steelers attitude of sticking to something even if the going gets tough. This is a team that has consistently been in playoff contention despite things like using its third-string quarterback to stitch together a winning season. Conner’s story is deeper than just a three-week turnaround but in the micro sense, it’s a nice chapter. In fact, it’s one that he celebrated on Instagram with a photo that his teammates quickly jumped all over and used as an opportunity to troll him.

https://twitter.com/Steelersdepot/status/1310570384010309634

There are a few things to love about this, but let’s start with the obvious. This Diet Coke senior photo is ripe for the trolling, and he should have known what he was getting into when he posted this. If your friend did this, you’d be hard pressed to not give them a hard time about it, so multiply that by the blustery swagger of an NFL locker room and you get exactly what happened in the comments of Conner’s photo.

But beyond the dunking on a teammate, this goes back to that Steelers attitude and how tightly knit the locker room is. Mike Tomlin is criminally underappreciated as an elite head coach, and things like this happen that aren’t quantifiable in terms of playbook success but count just as much when considering how well crafted the Steelers chemistry is.

Losing teams do not do this. Teams that are not well coached and fully synced up do not do this. It may seem as simple as innocent trolling but the context in which the trolling exists says a lot about how loose and tension-free Pittsburgh is. That goes a long way and is yet another testament to Steelers culture that produces as many wins as it does laughs.