In a recent puff piece about former Steelers quarterback Ben Roethlisberger, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette sought to bring some balance by asking Roethlisberger to list his professional regrets.
Neither Roethlisberger nor Ron Cook, the author of the essay, acknowledged the most obvious place for potential reflection and repentance. (Hey, if nobody talks about it, it didn’t happen, right?)
Instead, Roethlisberger bemoaned the team’s defeat in Super Bowl XLV while speculating on what would have happened in the event that center Maurkice Pouncey hadn’t hurt his ankle and had not fumbled the ball. (Don’t mention the mistake to Mendenhall.) In addition, Roethlisberger bemoaned the fact that the Steelers only triumphed in three playoff contests following the Super Bowl that ended the 2010 campaign.
That’s fascinating, I suppose. Roethlisberger was tutored by Hoeppner for four years. For three seasons, Cowher guided Roethlisberger.
Roethlisberger was coached by Mike Tomlin for 15 NFL seasons.
It’s reasonable to ask if Roethlisberger is alleging that Tomlin pampers the players. We’re sort of aware that he does, at least with players as talented as Antonio Brown.
Another way to say it is that Tomlin understands how to deal with guys that could be a problem and how to appeal to their higher selves. What could appear to be coddling is actually defusing (or at the very least postponing) a ticking time bomb.
Indeed, for years, we have heard that occasionally guys who weren’t known to be issues in Pittsburgh move on to other teams and cause internal chaos. Tomlin’s ability to direct players who may be predisposed to trouble away from doing so is something that other NFL coaches highly value. With Brown, Tomlin persevered in doing so for close to ten years.
Some people will see Given that he was occasionally an unpopular, self-centered figure in the early years of his career, Roethlisberger’s remarks seem humorous. Starting with the fallout from the 2004 AFC Championship, he became notorious for inflating and/or inventing injuries, or at least for doing so was suspected. He claimed he played although suffering from numerous fractured toes. Cowher proclaimed in front of the public that his rookie quarterback had no metatarsal bone fractures.
Young Ben had other problems as well, such as the motorbike accident that (in his words) brought him “seconds, maybe a minute from from death,” as well as a reputation in the locker room for occasionally being a little grumpy and distant.
In Playmakers, an entire chapter is devoted to Ben Roethlisberger’s journey toward atonement after serving a four-game ban in 2010. (One former teammate, who shall remain nameless, called Ben a turd.) It’s strange that the youthful misdeeds of this man have been completely forgotten to history, as was highlighted in Playmakers. It appears like Roethlisberger himself has joined the entire universe of people who have developed amnesia regarding the early stages of his career.
