Dan Rooney (37 page)

After about an hour, we emerged from the lodge to find tables of food and drink awaiting us. People from across the reservation had
been invited to share this traditional dinner, including the Catholic lay preacher from Sacred Heart, and we spent the evening together, talking and making new friends.

Two hundred years after the Lewis and Clark expedition, after being reduced to poverty and subjected to injustice, the Cheyennes willingly extended their hands in welcome to me and my family. To the Rooneys, they were kind, helpful, open human beings. If history were reversed, would western settlers of European heritage be as forgiving? I hope so.

We continued our trek all the way to Fort Clatsop and the Pacific Ocean. The kids had a great time playing on the beach. We even found a Steelers bar—completely decked out in black and gold—and had a good time meeting the owner and patrons, all citizens of the vast Steelers Nation.

Following our transcontinental trek, we returned to Pittsburgh where the Heinz History Center mounted a major exhibition titled
Rediscovering Lewis & Clark: A Journey with the Rooney Family.
Tens of thousands of people learned of Lewis and Clark while seeing the pictures we had taken on our journey and reading excerpts from our journals. The exhibit provided an interesting contrast with the America Lewis and Clark found in 1803.

 

 

At the same time we were enjoying our Lewis and Clark summer, my brother Pat called and suggested that I hand off the presidency of the Steelers. For the past few years, my son Art had taken on more and more responsibility in running the team, just as my father had encouraged me to do. I discussed the situation with my brothers, Art, Tim, John, and especially Pat. It seemed time for Art II to take the reins. I would stay on as chairman, but he would run the day-to-day operations of the franchise. At first I wasn't sure if I was ready to let
go. Tim asked me directly if it was okay with me. I assured him—and all my brothers—that Art was the right guy for the job. We all talked about how the business should be run. Art's legal background would serve him well, and today he's doing a terrific job. Of course, I am with him, just the way the Chief and I were, side by side at Three Rivers Stadium.

After the 2003 season it was apparent the Steelers needed to look for a quarterback. Kordell Stewart's “slash” style didn't always get us where we wanted to be. Tommy Maddox played well for a while, but with him at quarterback we'd gotten away from our identity as a tough, hard-nosed team that ran the ball on offense and stopped the run on defense. Our 6-10 record in 2003 earned us the eleventh pick in the first round of the 2004 NFL draft. During the process of evaluating and grading the college prospects, we looked carefully at the quarterbacks. Our staff had concluded that Eli Manning and Philip Rivers were the most polished of the prospects available, but there also was a big, strong, talented kid at Miami of Ohio named Ben Roethlisberger who intrigued a lot of our scouts. Manning and Rivers both were picked before our turn, and so our people seemed to have focused on Shawn Andrews, a big offensive tackle from Arkansas as our likely number-one pick.

But when our turn came, I couldn't bear the thought of passing on another great quarterback prospect the way we had passed on Dan Marino in 1983, so I steered the conversation around to Roethlisberger. After some more talk, we came to a consensus and picked Roethlisberger. Big Ben, six-foot-five, 240 pounds, was quick, tough, had a great arm, and could think on his feet. He was just what we needed.

We started the 2004 season with Maddox as quarterback, but he was injured in our second game—in Baltimore against the Ravens. Ben's first start came in our third game against the Dolphins, which was postponed until Sunday night because of a hurricane. He showed
himself to be a force of nature as well. With a great supporting cast around him, the team was solid.

But what Big Ben did that season is the stuff of legend: he went 13- 0 as a starter during the regular season to help us become just the fourth team in NFL history to finish 15-1. But the dream came to an end in the AFC championship game with a 41-27 loss to New England. This was the first time that I ever packed for the Super Bowl. I thought we'd win this one for sure. After the game Hines Ward openly wept for his friend and team leader Jerome Bettis. Everyone thought this would be the Bus's last shot at a Super Bowl. Hines said, “We didn't get the job done. There's a lot of guys who left it all on the field.”

Despite the amazing achievement of a 15-1 season, Bill Cowher was subdued after the game. He had coached the team to five AFC championship games—all of them at home—and won once.

The next season, this team had achieved the kind of closeness that wins Super Bowls. If we could keep that going, I thought we could go all the way. But before training camp it looked like things might unravel before we even got started. Jerome agreed to stay on for one more season, but Hines Ward held out. I called Jerome and said, “We need to get this done.”

He said, “I agree with you.”

“I think we can get it done.”

Bettis wasn't so sure—“Hines is tough.”

“Here's what I'd like you to do. Get Hines and bring him over to the Latrobe Airport. We'll meet in the back room. Nobody will know we're there.” This was not an official negotiation—no agents or management, other than me. Everyone else was at camp, or back in Pittsburgh.

Jerome persuaded Hines to come, and I talked to them both. To Hines I said, “Look, you mean everything to us. We want to get this done.”

He said, “Well, I need to get what I deserve.”

I said, “You'll get what you should get. You might not be one hundred percent happy with it, but you're going to get what's right.”

He said, “You've always been fair.”

We understood one another and left with a handshake.

I went back to Art and Kevin Colbert and told them, “You go talk to him and he'll sign. He wants to be here.”

For thirteen years Jerome had dreamed of winning a Super Bowl ring. He did everything a player can do—he had run for more than 13,000 yards—and he was a leader on the field and off. Casey Hampton, our nose tackle, said, “Jerome's our guy. He asked us to bring him home. That touched us. That's what we're fighting for.” The team rallied around him, from veteran Hines Ward, who signed and came to camp, to Ben Roethlisberger, our phenomenal second-year quarterback.

We went 11-5 for the season and entered the playoffs with a wild card berth. If we were going to get to the Super Bowl, we'd have to win all our games on the road—and that's tough, especially in the playoffs. We opened the postseason at Paul Brown Stadium against a very strong Cincinnati team. The Bengals jumped to a 10-0 lead, even without their starting quarterback, Carson Palmer, who had been knocked out of the game with a torn ACL.

But Ben was poised and in command. Cincinnati built a couple of 10-point leads in the first half, but each time Ben and the offense answered with a touchdown drive. The second of those came late in the first half when Roethlisberger was 3 for 3 for 74 of the drive's 76 yards, plus a touchdown to Hines Ward. Roethlisberger hadn't played well in the 2004 playoffs, but he opened his second go-round in the postseason by completing 14 of 19 for 208 yards with three touchdowns and no interceptions in a 31-17 win.

What a game. Hard-hitting, dramatic, gadget plays, something for everyone—unless you were a Cincinnati fan.

In the AFC divisional playoff, we faced Peyton Manning's heavily favored Colts. Not since the Immaculate Reception have I seen such a heart-stopping, edge-of-your-seat kind of game. Played at the RCA Dome, the noise sometimes seemed as loud as a jet engine.

Now, Manning is a great player, but in this game Ben was the best quarterback on the field. On the game's opening possession, Roethlisberger completed 6 of 7 for 76 yards and a touchdown; the only in-completion was a drop. The Colts punted on each of their opening two possessions before Roethlisberger struck again. On a third-and- 10 from the Pittsburgh 39-yard line, he found Hines Ward for 45. Two plays later, he made another strike to Heath Miller over the middle, making it 14-0 with 3:12 still to play in the first quarter.

The game became a fierce back-and-forth battle, and I will always remember Bettis's goal-line fumble; Ben's shoestring, touchdown-saving tackle; and a last-gasp missed field goal by Indianapolis. Final score, 21-18, and what a treat for football fans all over the world.

 

 

I always enjoy going into Denver. Even in the thin air of the Mile High City, we felt strong and confident. I talked to my good friend Pat Bowlen, president of the Broncos, before the game. He was confident of his team, too, and I know he fully expected to beat us. We had lost many of these conference championships in recent years, but this time we came into the game in the right frame of mind. Russ Grimm, our assistant head coach, and a great player as a member of the Washington Redskins offensive line known as “the Hogs,” helped set the tone early on game day and got the team fired up.

Again, it was Ben who led us. In building a 10-0 lead, Roethlisberger was 7 for 8 for 89 yards and a touchdown, and on the Steelers' other two touchdown drives of the half he completed 6 of 9 for 91 yards and another score.

But it wasn't just the offense that dominated. In helping build that 24-3 halftime lead, the defense limited the Broncos to six first downs and 38 yards rushing while forcing two turnovers. Jeff Reed's 47-yard field goal ten minutes into the game established a positive attitude right at the start. By the end of the game the Steelers Nation made its presence known, swinging Terrible Towels and cheering on our defense as much as our offense. We saw as much Steelers black and gold as Broncos orange and blue that day. Final score, 34-17, and we were off for Super Bowl XL.

By a strange quirk of fate, the Super Bowl would be played February 5, 2006, in Jerome Bettis's hometown—Detroit. Everyone in Motor City seemed behind us. They wanted to see Jerome get his ring as much as we did. The game really came down to three plays. Willie Parker scored on a 75-yard touchdown run, the longest in Super Bowl history. Our cornerback, Ike Taylor, intercepted a Matt Hasselbeck pass on our 5-yard line. And then another of Bill Cowher's patented gadget plays. Randle El took a reverse handoff and threw a 43-yard touchdown to Hines Ward. Roethlisberger became the youngest quarterback to ever win a Super Bowl. And Jerome Bettis held high on the victory stand the Lombardi Trophy. His good friend Hines Ward was named the game's MVP. Bill Cowher had realized his Super Bowl dream, and the Steelers had a fifth championship to bring home to Pittsburgh.

And as I stood there on the podium with my son Art beside me, I flashed back to our very first Super Bowl in 1975, more than thirty years ago. This team was much like that first team. They were young guys who had worked hard for it, who really, really gave it everything they had. Like then, everything came together at the same time—coaches, players, and the entire organization. The first one is special because it was the first. Super Bowl XL is special because, throughout the playoffs, we were on the road and nobody expected us to win eight games in a row. We had the talent, the coaching, good organization,
and that intangible thing—team closeness. As Bill Cowher told the media the day after the game, “I said before, in my fourteen years in Pittsburgh, we've had good teams, we've had confident teams, but this was the closest team we've ever had. . . . There are a lot of things that made this group a special group. The coaching staff we had, the best coaching staff, I think, in the National Football League. So I give a lot of credit to them, and it certainly starts at the top with the stability of Mr. Rooney and Kevin Colbert.”

I'll never forget the Super Bowl XL victory celebration in Pittsburgh on February 7. Black and gold covered the town. Automobile, truck, and bus traffic came to a halt as fans—families, students, office workers—streamed to the Point by the hundreds of thousands. It seemed the whole Steelers Nation had descended on the Golden Triangle in downtown Pittsburgh. As the Steelers motorcade crawled through the streets, people stretched out their hands to touch the cars and the players, some of whom perched dangerously on the roofs and trunks of the vehicles. Troy Polamalu and James Harrison dove off their truck to body-surf the crowd. The fans—the whole community—came together in their shared joy and pride. They climbed light poles and trees to get better views. They watched from rooftops, fire escapes, and out the windows of towering skyscrapers. Even the horse patrol waved Terrible Towels. Elbow to elbow they packed the square at Gateway Center, where a temporary stage had been erected. Children balanced on their parents' shoulders, and flashes sparkled from the crowd as people held their cameras and cell phones high above their heads, hoping to record even a blurry image of their hometown heroes. The energy of a quarter million chanting, cheering fans echoed off the glass-and-steel buildings and thrilled the players. A half-dozen high school marching bands led the crowd in singing the “Steelers Polka” and “Here We Go.” Bettis, holding aloft the Lombardi Trophy, made a heartfelt speech, as did several other players. A sign had been handed to me as we made our way along the parade
route. It read simply, “THANKS.” When I got to the microphone, I held it up and said, “This sign says it all, and it's for you.” And I meant it, too.

 

 

For seventeen years, Paul Tagliabue had led the NFL as commissioner. Paul took over at a time when we had serious problems, but he was up to the challenge. We were coming off two strikes, three franchise moves, a decade of litigation, and flat television contracts. We had not expanded in twenty years, had built hardly any new stadiums, had no labor deal, and were facing lawsuits from players. The league needed to revitalize its structure in order to get things done. It had little control over NFL Properties or the Management Council. The commissioner was not in charge of either of those areas.