"We're talking about the few. We're not talking about the many."
Finally. Someone finally spoke it out loud.
A ton transpired at the opening of the Steelers' OTAs yesterday at the Rooney Complex. Most of it came in the form of sooth-saying remarks from Ben Roethlisberger, reassuring us all that he is not, in fact, some spawn of Satan, but there also were the official arrivals of the new veterans, the new rookies and, maybe, a more visible approach toward leadership.
The man doing the speaking above, of course, was Cam Heyward.
And the subject, of course, was drama. As in, whether anything will change in 2019. As in, whether Mike Tomlin or the team's captains -- including Heyward -- need to rein anything or anyone in.
"What needs to be reined in?" Heyward began replying before the reporter's question was even complete, then repeatedly shaking his head and muttering, "No, no, no" through the remainder of the question. At which point he spoke what's above and continued, "We've got a great group of guys that are hard-nosed and just trying to get better. Coach T's going to coach it like he wants to. I don't make that decision. But I also don't expect that decision."
Good for him. And again, it's about time.
For months now, I've been writing that the Steelers never were a circus but, rather, a couple of clowns. And now, for the first time out loud and in living color, we can hear it and see it for ourselves.
Players had whispered that to me all through the 2018 season, first regarding Le'Veon Bell, then Antonio Brown. But they'd never breathe it near a microphone, never wanting to be that bad teammate. And as a result, the narrative went wild, many miles beyond our city limits. The Steelers became the NFL's running joke, the punchline to every hot take on every bigmouth-back-and-forth show. It wasn't Bell or Brown who created the circus, the talking heads would maintain, but some nebulous culture that crafted them into egomaniacal, moronic monsters.
As if.
When people like me say or write a rejection of that, then we're homers, too close to the situation to be objective.
And when people like Cam or anyone else in the locker room says it, again, they're that bad teammate.
But here, in this sunny, autumn-simulated setting that seemed to set a stage for the return of football, amid the barking coaches and blaring horns, was a bunch of guys having a good time going about their business. It was Roethlisberger shouting toward Joe Haden after the latter had picked off his opening pass of seven-shots, "That's to get you ready!" It was Vance McDonald whipping the tight ends into a frenzy before their usual forays with the blocking sleds. It was Diontae Johnson, beginning to leave the field after practice, only to turn around and recognize that JuJu Smith-Schuster was still out there, then reversing course.
Player attendance: Close to perfect, with the only absences accompanied by real personal reasons.
It's all been building up for months, too.
Ramon Foster acknowledged that the team's leaders have found a commonality in fending off the culture nonsense, adding, "When some stuff is said, you kind of just laugh at it. Because the guys that know, they genuinely know. The truth is known by only a few, anyway. The truth doesn't have a voice on social media."
Listen to what he told me about the team's current state of mind:
Listen to Cam when I brought up the same:
Yeah, these guys are real problems. Ben, too. And Haden. And Maurkice Pouncey. And Vince Williams. Rotten apples, all of them.
Or not. Or, most accurately, they couldn't care less what anyone thinks. And trust me, that's no act.
Which isn't to intimate that anything's been achieved to date. All of these individuals, chiefly Tomlin, need to seize the moment in front of them, whether they see the circumstance as imaginary or not. Because they do have the clowns gone. They do have the franchise quarterback humbled. And they do, very much for real, still have contender-level talent.
So take it. Run with it.
“Listen, we’ve been attacked from all different angles this offseason," was how Roethlisberger worded it. "We just need to stick together and have each other’s backs.”
“With what we’ve had to go through, I think it’s kind of numb now," Foster said. "When some of that stuff is said, you kind of just laugh at it. Because the guys that know, they genuinely know. Once you paint us a certain way, we don't really have a rebuttal. Or the rebuttal doesn't matter."
One rebuttal would, actually. But that's several months away.
MATT SUNDAY GALLERY
Steelers organized team activity, Rooney Sports Complex, May 21, 2019 - MATT SUNDAY / DKPS