2019 Steelers: The More Things Change...

mr_smith02

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New thread for a new year...sadly, same issues still exist for the Steelers.

2019 Schedule:

At home the Steelers will play the Baltimore Ravens, Cincinnati Bengals and Cleveland Browns in the North, in addition to the Buffalo Bills, Indianapolis Colts, Miami Dolphins, Los Angeles Rams and Seattle Seahawks.

On the road the team will face Baltimore, Cincinnati and Cleveland, as well as the Arizona Cardinals, Los Angeles Chargers, New England Patriots, New York Jets and San Francisco 49ers.
 
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[icon]

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Jul 30, 2005
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Would love for the Steelers to play Hardball with Brown ala Bell. Show up, or don't get paid.... but you signed a deal less than 2 years ago and have played less than half of it. Pittsburgh owns dat ass for the next several seasons.

That $2.5MM Roster bonus on March 17th (and $22MM Cap hit) likely has a lot to do with the timing of this tantrum. Make enough noise to make the Steelers not want to absorb the hit... we shall see.
 

mr_smith02

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Tim Benz is horrible. Nothing new in that article.
Brown's social media goodbye to Steelers fans and the clearest indications that AB did, in fact, request a trade hadn't been posted here on SoSH...that's why I included that article in this thread (saw nothing about it in the 2018 Steelers thread either). I truly don't know Benz and just decided to use a link from the Pittsburgh Tribune (pretty certain nothing in the article was inaccurate).

Just thought Steelers fans might want to discuss where the team goes from here with AB given his post yesterday.
 

BigJimEd

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Brown's social media goodbye to Steelers fans and the clearest indications that AB did, in fact, request a trade hadn't been posted here on SoSH...that's why I included that article in this thread (saw nothing about it in the 2018 Steelers thread either). I truly don't know Benz and just decided to use a link from the Pittsburgh Tribune (pretty certain nothing in the article was inaccurate).

Just thought Steelers fans might want to discuss where the team goes from here with AB given his post yesterday.
sorry, poor wording on my post. Didn't mean you should not post it. I'm just not a fan of Benz.
 

[icon]

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I will admit that this scenario made me run down the rabbit hole of NFL WR Salaries..

Guaranteed Money for 2019:
Cooks $27.5MM
Evans $20MM
ODBJr $17MM
Brown $15.1MM
...
46th) Edelman $2.875MM
48th) Matt Slater $2.5MM

Takeaways:
1) Perhaps Brown sees the Cooks deal & wants to sign a new 4-5yr deal that doesn't expire at an age where investment will be tempered?
2) God, what a deal we have in Superbowl MVP Edelman relative to other teams' WR1s.
3) How is Slater making as much as Edelman? :D
 

BigJimEd

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Would love for the Steelers to play Hardball with Brown ala Bell. Show up, or don't get paid.... but you signed a deal less than 2 years ago and have played less than half of it. Pittsburgh owns dat ass for the next several seasons.

That $2.5MM Roster bonus on March 17th (and $22MM Cap hit) likely has a lot to do with the timing of this tantrum. Make enough noise to make the Steelers not want to absorb the hit... we shall see.
As a Pat's fan, I'd love to see it too.
I think the Steelers org has learned from the Bell situation. While they might feel they are in the right to play hardball with Brown, it's likely in their best interest to move forward without him. I think they'll be able to get a decent return for him.
 

steveluck7

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Is there any sense of how Big Ben feels about all of this? He's flirted with retirement previously so I wonder what he thinks about 2 of his biggest weapons being gone. It's not like they'd be going into a rebuild or anything but at what point would he start to question the program?
 

[icon]

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Jul 30, 2005
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Is there any sense of how Big Ben feels about all of this? He's flirted with retirement previously so I wonder what he thinks about 2 of his biggest weapons being gone. It's not like they'd be going into a rebuild or anything but at what point would he start to question the program?
I've not seen anything but it's a very valid concern. Ben seems to have only publicly expressed concern for his line's return:

“I’ve got another year on my contract, and as long as 53’s [Pouncey] coming back, I’ll be back.”

“I think we’ve got a really good group. The linemen, as long as they come back, they’re the core. They’re the strength of this team and if they come back, I’ll be back and I feel good.”​

That said... while Juju is coming on strong running opposite Brown, I question his ability to be an elite #1 as the primary focus of the Offense.
 

DanoooME

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I will admit that this scenario made me run down the rabbit hole of NFL WR Salaries..

Guaranteed Money for 2019:
Cooks $27.5MM
Evans $20MM
ODBJr $17MM
Brown $15.1MM
...
46th) Edelman $2.875MM
48th) Matt Slater $2.5MM

Takeaways:
1) Perhaps Brown sees the Cooks deal & wants to sign a new 4-5yr deal that doesn't expire at an age where investment will be tempered?
2) God, what a deal we have in Superbowl MVP Edelman relative to other teams' WR1s.
3) How is Slater making as much as Edelman? :D
Not sure where you get some of these numbers.

Brown is only guaranteed $2.5M as of the middle of March (roster bonus) and none of his salary is guaranteed at this point or going forward.
Beckham should be $17M guaranteed as long as he shows to collect his workout bonus; the $16.75M salary is guaranteed this year. $2.75M is guaranteed next year
Evans is $20M, his contract is the easiest.
Cooks is guaranteed only $9,459,000 of his combined $1M salary and $9,459,000 roster bonus due mid-March.
 

j-man

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my dad and uncles are big pitt fans

they have 11-5 12-4 talent but a 7-9 8-8 coach i couild see 10 W for them next Year but if u assume a Loss to NE LAR SEA Balt 1 Cle 1 and their gift for loseing 1-3 games aga awful teams like DEN OAK it looks like 500 or so
 

DeadlySplitter

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that's a theoretically soft road schedule besides Foxboro, at least. I have a feeling SD takes a couple steps back.

then again, you missed the playoffs losing to soft teams on the road...
 

soxhop411

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AB still has a beef with roethlisberger

It may not have escalated quickly, but it definitely has escalated.

Steelers receiver Antonio Brown, whose primary beef in Pittsburgh seems to be directed at quarterback Ben Roethlisberger, has weaponized Brown’s Twitter account. Although Brown has said nothing about Roethlisberger on the official @AB84 account (yet), Brown has used the “like” button in a way that Ben surely won’t like.


At the top of Brown’s “likes” are a pair of tweetsposted by the account named @KIP_Music. Both tweets refer to the past allegations of sexual assault against Roethlisberger.

“Pittsburgh Steelers fans be like ‘get rid of [Brown] he hits women’ but be like ‘Big Ben is my hero’.. wait!! Didn’t he rape two college girls,” one of the tweets says.
http://profootballtalk.nbcsports.com/2019/02/15/antonio-brown-uses-twitter-as-a-weapon-against-ben-roethlisberger/
 

DJnVa

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That's fine--BB will call up Matty P, tell him to get it done, then forward him on over.
 

DennyDoyle'sBoil

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That's fine--BB will call up Matty P, tell him to get it done, then forward him on over.
Are there rules on that? Can a team trade for a player in order to flip him to another team or does there need to be an intention to play him?

I remember hearing on NFL radio at one point that there was some kinds of shenanigans with contracts and franchise tags that are not permitted.

I don't imagine the league could prohibit two arms length transactions. Like, team A gives a 3d round pick for a player, and then later agrees to trade him to another team for a 2d rounder, so long as there is time in between and it wasn't agreed upon at the beginning. Maybe the second team has a receiver injured or whatever. But I could see if it were improper for a team to trade for a player with no intention to play him solely to flip to a team that trading team didn't want to deal with.
 

shoosh77

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Wasn’t there a clause when Favre was traded to the Jets that they couldn’t trade him on to an NFC North team? I’d expect something similar to that, esp if the deal was with a Pats relation.
 

MuppetAsteriskTalk

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Wasn’t there a clause when Favre was traded to the Jets that they couldn’t trade him on to an NFC North team? I’d expect something similar to that, esp if the deal was with a Pats relation.
There was with Favre, but I think the NFL now has a "no poison pills" rule of some sort. Although I'm not exactly sure how it works in practice, nor if it would prevent a Favre like trade now.
 

Cousin Walter

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I believe when Parcells traded RB Adrian Murrell to the Cardinals in 1998, there was some kind of agreement preventing ARI from then trading the player to the Patriots.
 

Ralphwiggum

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Correct. The Pats traded their $100M starting QB to Buffalo.
I mean in hindsight, isn’t this just about the ballsiest move of BB’s entire career in New England? Even with the Super Bowl win there was still a large contingent of fans and, maybe more importantly, media who thought Drew was the better QB. And they went and traded him in the division. The blowback potential was off the charts, just more evidence that Belichick does not give even the littlest of shits what anyone else thinks.
 

BigSoxFan

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I mean in hindsight, isn’t this just about the ballsiest move of BB’s entire career in New England? Even with the Super Bowl win there was still a large contingent of fans and, maybe more importantly, media who thought Drew was the better QB. And they went and traded him in the division. The blowback potential was off the charts, just more evidence that Belichick does not give even the littlest of shits what anyone else thinks.
Yup. That was back when Belichick was killing it with his trades. Bledsoe turned into the pick that became Ty Warren who was obviously a really good player for us. And then he trades the Pats pick in 2003 for a Balt #2 which became Eugene Wilson and the 2004 1st that became Vince Wilfork.
 

tims4wins

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For sure it was ballsy. I have always kind of wondered how it would have gone had the Pats lost to the Rams. This kind of goes back to the thread about which title was most meaningful, but while 2003 was somewhat of a lost Super Bowl, it was also the title that legitimized both the Pats and Brady as a worthy champion.
 

loshjott

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I mean in hindsight, isn’t this just about the ballsiest move of BB’s entire career in New England? Even with the Super Bowl win there was still a large contingent of fans and, maybe more importantly, media who thought Drew was the better QB. And they went and traded him in the division. The blowback potential was off the charts, just more evidence that Belichick does not give even the littlest of shits what anyone else thinks.
Props to Kraft for allowing it also (per the Great thread).
 

dcmissle

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tims4wins

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It better not be in Fox. He is certified crazy. I need someone to translate this.

"If your squad out there want to win and your squad want a hungry wide receiver who's the best in the whole world, someone hit my phone," Brown said into his phone camera while working on an elliptical. "Tell them I ain't doing no unguarantees. I ain't even gonna play myself no more for this NFL, you heard."

"I think I done done everything. What y'all think? What's left for me to do?" Brown said. "Win a Super Bowl? Hey, gotta be the right team for that, right? Who wants smoke? I've got a lot of fuel built up. When this fuel turns to smoke, hope you're in shape, hope you're ready to go the distance. I'm telling you, I'm ready to go 36 rounds, like a heavyweight, ya heard. ...

"If your team got guaranteed money, tell them call me. AB can't do no more unguarantees. So we clear. I want ya'll to be clear and understand something. This is not a game, people. This is not for show; this is not to be cool. This is strictly to inspire you that no one can determine your destination but you."
 

BigSoxFan

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One could read the last sentence of the tweet two ways. If *time to move on* = time to part ways, the tweet’s purpose is to soften the parting a bit with the fan base.

Edit — and that appears to be the meaning.

https://profootballtalk.nbcsports.com/2019/02/19/source-steelers-agree-to-try-to-trade-antonio-brown/

Everyone will be on best behavior so the Steelers can max value and he winds in a decent spot. They ought to be able to get a first round pick. The spot won’t be Fox.
I'm bearish on them getting a 1st round pick. The guy appears to have fully stepped into TO land. The amount of red flags that he's thrown up the past few months/years are going to really hurt his marketability. He clearly wants to get paid top dollar. He has off the field domestic violence issues. He's a pain in the locker room. He turns 31 before next season.

Someone will take the plunge but I have a hard time believing it will be for a 1st. We shall see.
 

Morgan's Magic Snowplow

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I'm bearish on them getting a 1st round pick. The guy appears to have fully stepped into TO land. The amount of red flags that he's thrown up the past few months/years are going to really hurt his marketability. He clearly wants to get paid top dollar. He has off the field domestic violence issues. He's a pain in the locker room. He turns 31 before next season.

Someone will take the plunge but I have a hard time believing it will be for a 1st. We shall see.
I think everything depends on how strongly he demands a new deal as a trade condition. His current deal is a great contract for an acquiring team. If he wants a new deal with $50M guaranteed at age 31, not so much.
 

dcmissle

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I don't get how he is already asking for a new deal. He just signed two years ago for a shit ton.
He appears to be contradicting s statement attributed to him a couple of days ago — that he is not demanding a new contract. Unless I read the report wrong.

The existing contract is team friendly. $39 million, three years, none of it guaranteed.
 

BigSoxFan

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I think everything depends on how strongly he demands a new deal as a trade condition. His current deal is a great contract for an acquiring team. If he wants a new deal with $50M guaranteed at age 31, not so much.
Yup. It's impossible to interpret his tweets but I read them as him not being 100% on board with his current contract because he wants guaranteed money. The guy is just off the reservation. Really have to wonder how many teams will even be interested. NFL circles must know a ton more about him than we all do. Wouldn't be surprised if, like TO, he has a few short stints before he retires.
 

tims4wins

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He appears to be contradicting s statement attributed to him a couple of days ago — that he is not demanding a new contract. Unless I read the report wrong.

The existing contract is team friendly. $39 million, three years, none of it guaranteed.
It's only team friendly to the acquiring team. It's like he forgot he got a $19 signing bonus two years ago. Yes he could be cut by the acquiring team for no cost, but he already received that $19M.
 

NortheasternPJ

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"I think I done done everything. What y'all think? What's left for me to do?" Brown said. "Win a Super Bowl? Hey, gotta be the right team for that, right? Who wants smoke? I've got a lot of fuel built up. When this fuel turns to smoke, hope you're in shape, hope you're ready to go the distance. I'm telling you, I'm ready to go 36 rounds, like a heavyweight, ya heard. ...

"If your team got guaranteed money, tell them call me. AB can't do no more unguarantees. So we clear. I want ya'll to be clear and understand something. This is not a game, people. This is not for show; this is not to be cool. This is strictly to inspire you that no one can determine your destination but you."
So if you're a team that has guaranteed money and a Super Bowl contender, to a guy who's not even a free agent, is bailing on his team (which is one of the top 3-4 teams in the AFC), bailed on his team before the season even ended, doesn't respect his coach, is going to be 31 next season, then give him a call?
 

dcmissle

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All it takes is one. Guy has JETS written all over him.
 

Harry Hooper

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All it takes is one. Guy has JETS written all over him.
Yes, as we saw with Revis, owner Woody seems to think if he can have the best player in the league at a given position that it somehow validates the whole roster as being a very good team.
 

mr_smith02

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Well, now the Steelers will be putting all the eggs in the Big Ben basket. Brown will be gone, Bell will be gone, Shazier is not returning to the field...this team has lost three of its most talented players over the course of the past two seasons. Now, it is all about an aging QB turning to two young upstarts in JuJu and Conner. Here's hoping they get something of value back in a trade of Brown...and possibly for Bell too. Then, it is time to hope the draft goes well too. At least the daily drama/distraction of Brown and Bell will be gone, but one has to imagine every loss next season will be met with countless questions of what the team would have done if Bell and Brown were still around. Still, I will be happy to not have to root for the two any longer...they made enjoying football much more difficult the past two seasons.
 

NortheasternPJ

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Well, now the Steelers will be putting all the eggs in the Big Ben basket. Brown will be gone, Bell will be gone, Shazier is not returning to the field...this team has lost three of its most talented players over the course of the past two seasons. Now, it is all about an aging QB turning to two young upstarts in JuJu and Conner. Here's hoping they get something of value back in a trade of Brown...and possibly for Bell too. Then, it is time to hope the draft goes well too. At least the daily drama/distraction of Brown and Bell will be gone, but one has to imagine every loss next season will be met with countless questions of what the team would have done if Bell and Brown were still around. Still, I will be happy to not have to root for the two any longer...they made enjoying football much more difficult the past two seasons.
My biggest interest is JuJu when AB's not on the field. I'm not saying he's Chris Hogan, but being the #1 with no real #2 changes things dramatically. Conner's second half wasn't great and he dropped a couple of key passes when it counted. Steelerfury.com is not a happy place right now.

Pitt's been probably the most talented team in the league / AFC for the last couple years, they'll probably pull out some other superstar WR out of the draft in the 2-3 rounds to keep it going.
 

DennyDoyle'sBoil

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Steelers actually have money for free agents. Even with the Brown cap hit, they roll over a bunch of money because of Bell and they can spread Brown over two years if they want to, which actually gives them about $10 million in cap relief this year if they want it. If they parlay Brown into a 2d rounder, with their two best offensive skill players in Juju and Connor being cheap they actually have room to improve a bit. You can't replace by Brown, but if there's any addition by subtraction, they could easily be a 10 plus win team again.
 

mr_smith02

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Steelers actually have money for free agents. Even with the Brown cap hit, they roll over a bunch of money because of Bell and they can spread Brown over two years if they want to, which actually gives them about $10 million in cap relief this year if they want it. If they parlay Brown into a 2d rounder, with their two best offensive skill players in Juju and Connor being cheap they actually have room to improve a bit. You can't replace by Brown, but if there's any addition by subtraction, they could easily be a 10 plus win team again.
Maybe, just maybe, Tomlin, Colbert, Rooney, Jr. and Big Ben use the AB and Bell dramas as a wake-up call and get back to having a semblance of control on and off the field.
 

tims4wins

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I am kind of rooting for both Bell and Brown to end up on the Niners. That team could be a ton of fun to watch, especially not being in the AFC. Imagine a Jimmy-Brady Super Bowl next year.