PITTSBURGH – Ben Roethlisberger wants to return to the Pittsburgh Steelers for the 2021 season, Art Rooney II team president said on Thursday, but for that to happen, the team and its veteran defender have to make some difficult decisions.
With the drop in the salary cap due to a drop in revenue due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Roethlisberger’s $ 41.2 million cap for 2021 is unbearable, Rooney said.
“Ben wants to come back,” he said in his call to end the season. “I left the door open.
“I think I was in front of Ben, letting him know that we couldn’t return him under the current contract. I think he understands that we have something to do there. We will have more conversations internally and we will carry more many conversations with Ben and we will have to know the limit number to complete some of these decisions. “
After losing the Cleveland Browns wild card, Roethlisberger, 38, said he would talk to the family before making a concrete decision to return for 2021, but said he hoped those Steelers would he wanted to go back if he decided to do so. But will Rooney and his team give him the opportunity to write his own end to a historic career?
“With Ben, we owe it to him to have a conversation about how he wants to end his career, and we intend to do that.”
In order to get a ceiling reduction and give Roethlisberger at least one more season to finish on his own terms, Steelers could ask the defender to reduce his salaries in the last year of his contract. The Steelers have already prorated $ 22,250,000 from his contract, leaving only $ 19 million – $ 4 million in base salary and a $ 15 million bonus – to work on a pay cut or restructuring. The more enjoyable option is an extension and restructuring that spreads part of the hit cover in the 2022 season.
“I think these are discussions we will have with Ben and his representative,” Rooney said of the possibilities of massing Roethlisberger’s contract. “It takes two to find out if we can agree with what he wants. We’ll just have to see.”
As of now, the Steelers have three defenders on the roster for the 2021 season: Roethlisberger, Mason Rudolph and newcomer Dwayne Haskins. But Rooney acknowledged that he needs to add another signal caller, and can put them on the raffle for one of the big-name defenders if they can set up the cover to accommodate him.
“I think when we look at our room, we’re going to have to add someone to the room this season,” Rooney said. “We will look at all the opportunities we have to do this.”
Determining Roethlisberger’s future is just the first step in many difficult decisions and discussions for the Steelers this season.
Director Kevin Colbert’s one-year contract will be in effect after the project, and while Rooney said the two have had many discussions about Colbert’s future, nothing is official.
“I feel like Kevin will be back, but who knows,” Rooney said.
Coach Mike Tomlin’s contract lasts at least the 2021 season with an option for the 2022 season, and in evaluating his head coach, Rooney said he believes Tomlin will lead the team in the future.
“We will approach Mike’s contract with him as time goes on this off-season,” he said. “I will just say that I feel comfortable saying that he will be our coach in the future. … As for the job he did, we didn’t finish as we would like. The playoff game is hard to analyze. .. just by turning the ball that way, you won’t win many games. I don’t see how you attribute this to the coach’s training. I think the team got into that game ready. “
Rooney also said that, if everything depended on him, he would enter the 2021 season with the same list that the team had in 2020.
“If I had my druthers, I would say if I could have the same list next year, I would,” he said. – Obviously not.
Given the team’s salary cap situation – Steelers are estimated to exceed nearly $ 30 million, with 48 players signed, according to the ESPN List Management System – re-enrolling free agents like Bud Dupree and JuJu Smith-Schuster will be difficult , if not almost impossible.
“It’s fair to say this is going to be the most difficult salary cap challenge we’ve had in a long time, maybe ever,” Rooney said.
But the first step in finding out the rest of the list is to determine Roethlisberger’s future.
Asked directly if he wants Roethlisberger to return, Rooney paused and said he wanted him back, but offered no guarantees about the defender’s future.
“I think we’d love to see Ben back in another year if that can work,” he said. “But, as I said, there is a lot of work to be done if this can happen; decisions may need to be made on both sides for this to happen.”