Seven reasons to extend Big Ben's contract
PITTSBURGH - Ben Roethlisberger is celebrating his 26th birthday today, and for a guy who seemingly has everything -- fame, money, a Super Bowl ring -- there is one belated present that the Steelers quarterback would love to get: a contract extension.
Locking up Roethlisberger, who still has two years left on his current deal, for a couple of presidential terms is one of the Steelers' top offseason priorities.
Director of football operations Kevin Colbert recently said that talks between the Steelers and Roethlisberger's agent, Ryan Tollner, are going well. And there isn't any reason to think the Steelers and Roethlisberger won't reach an agreement on an extension before the start of training camp.
Not that the Steelers need any reminder but, in a nod to his jersey number, here are seven reasons why they have to get a deal done with Roethlisberger.
1. It all starts with the quarterback.
Colbert was recently asked what position he would address first if he were starting a team and he didn't hesitate to answer.
"You've always got to look at the quarterback position," he said. "To me, a franchise is only as good as your quarterback."
The Steelers have won a Super Bowl and two division titles in the four seasons that Roethlisberger has been a starter.
The subpar season he had in 2006 -- and there were mitigating circumstances for his regression even if Roethlisberger is loathe to admit it -- shows as much as his success how vital the position of quarterback is.
Roethlisberger threw 23 interceptions, the most in the NFL, and uneven play at quarterback contributed mightily to the Steelers stumbling to 8-8 a season after winning the Super Bowl and missing the playoffs.
Roethlisberger rebounded in a big way last season and with all due respect to James Harrison, he was the Steelers' most valuable player.
Where would the Steelers have been without the franchise-record 32 touchdown passes Roethlisberger tossed or the improvisation he conjured up on a regular basis, which helped cover for the deficiencies of the offensive line?
"The reality is (when) you've got an elite quarterback you've got a chance to win (every week)," Steelers coach Mike Tomlin said. "He's that."
2. Drafting a quarterback, even with the first overall pick, is always a risky proposition.
Given how their careers forked after they were taken first and second in the 1998 draft, it seems preposterous now, but the Colts did give serious consideration to taking Ryan Leaf over Peyton Manning with the No. 1 pick.
Indianapolis selected Manning, and the perennial Pro Bowler has won a Super Bowl and will be a first-ballot Pro Football Hall of Famer. Leaf, meanwhile, washed out in San Diego, and he threw 14 touchdown passes and 36 interceptions in the four NFL seasons he played.
That the two were considered so close as far as prospects coming out of college shows just how difficult it is for teams to pinpoint which quarterbacks will be able to make the transition to the NFL.
And it isn't getting any easier because of changes in the college game.
"A lot of (college) guys are playing in a shotgun on a consistent basis, the spread offense and (the NFL) does not do as much of that," Texans coach Gary Kubiak said. "There's been a lot of guys not so highly rated that have made a tremendous jump and become great players in this league and there have been guys very highly rated that have not been able to make that jump."
The Steelers were the beneficiaries of good timing in that that they had a relatively high pick in a year that produced three quarterbacks (Eli Manning and Philip Rivers were the others) that were drafted in the first round and actually panned out.
The four quarterbacks taken in the first round of the 2004 draft were the most since five were selected in 1999.
Donovan McNabb is the headliner of that group and Daunte Culpepper had several standout seasons before he hurt his knee. Tim Couch, the first overall pick of the draft, turned out to be a bust, and does anyone know what Akili Smith and Cade McNown are doing these days?
That class alone shows just how easy it is for teams to make mistakes when drafting quarterbacks in the first round.
3. It has gotten harder to play quarterback.
Quarterback may be the most important position in all of sports. It may also be the most difficult to play, and the demands quarterbacks now face make it that much harder to project which young ones will succeed and which ones won't be able to cut it.
Kubiak played almost 10 seasons in the NFL, mostly serving as John Elway's backup in Denver, and he said: "The game's (more) difficult from a scheme standpoint. The people that are coming now are bigger, stronger, faster. There's so many things that go with playing that position."
The Steelers were fortunate for a couple of reasons when an injury to Tommy Maddox thrust Roethlisberger into the starting lineup as a rookie in 2004.
Roethlisberger, despite playing only three seasons at Miami of Ohio, proved to be up to the task of starting, and the Steelers protected him by not putting too much on his shoulders, broad as they are.
The success Roethlisberger had -- he won his first 13 starts, which set an NFL record -- is the exception and not the rule for quarterbacks that are forced to play early in their career.
Too many young quarterbacks simply are not surrounded by enough talent, and they inevitably flounder because they are asked to do too much.
"You have to have a running game, you better be able to play good defense and have a good kicker, too, so it doesn't fall on the quarterback," Chiefs coach Herm Edwards said on what it takes for a young signal-caller to succeed. "It starts with your offensive line. You have to protect the guy."
4. Teams generally don't have the luxury of letting young quarterbacks develop.
Terry Bradshaw will be the first to admit that had he come along in a different era, he probably never would have played his entire career in Pittsburgh.
Bradshaw, the first overall pick of the 1970 draft, threw 73 interceptions in his first four seasons. In today's NFL, he said, he probably wouldn't have lasted past his first contract with the Steelers.
"(Teams) were patient with their draft choices back then because we weren't going anywhere," Bradshaw said. "But because of free agency and the salary cap, young players have to play immediately."
That is particularly true of a quarterback in which teams invest a high draft pick. They make too much money and there is simply too much pressure on coaches to play them because of their high profile -- even if the quarterback is not yet ready to play.
5. Roethlisberger is still growing.
Steelers offensive coordinator Bruce Arians said after Roethlisberger was selected to his first Pro Bowl that he still has plenty of room to improve.
Indeed, Roethlisberger still has the tendency to force throws, and he sometimes holds onto the ball too long in an attempt to make a play.
But he is still well south of 30 years old, and he only figures to only get better even if he has already established himself as a franchise quarterback.
"He's and emerging player," Tomlin said. "You know he's capable of being great. We expect him to be."
6. He has that toughness that Pittsburgh demands of its gridiron heroes.
Roethlisberger was sacked 47 times last season, yet he played in every game except one.
And he probably wouldn't have missed the regular-season finale at Baltimore had the Steelers needed to win that game.
The 6-5, 241-pound Roethlisberger is as sturdy as he is durable, and he is not exactly one to slide when he tucks the ball in and runs.
The long touchdown run he had in the Steelers' 31-28 win over the Browns in November is proof of that.
Roethlisberger took off after his protection broke down, and at no point during his 30-yard run that gave the Steelers a 24-21 lead in the fourth quarter did he give any indication that he was going to tuck the ball in and assume the fetal position at the feet of a defensive player.
Roethlisberger punctuated his run by diving into the end zone, and that play turned out to be one of the pivotal ones of the game.
7. He likes it here.
Roethlisberger has made Pittsburgh his home, and he apparently has an appreciation for what it means to play for a franchise as storied as the Steelers.
"I would love to retire here," Roethlisberger told the Tribune-Review in January. "I would love to go the Hall of Fame in a Steelers jersey. That would be an ultimate goal. I want to do what (Dan) Marino, (Jim) Kelly, (John) Elway and all those guys did -- play with one team their whole career."
Now, it's up to the Steelers -- and Roethlisberger, to a degree -- to make that happen.