For all the fuss kicked up with the Steelers' opener in Foxborough a week ago, from headsets to head-shaking playcalls, what might have gotten lost is something of potentially great significance to the franchise that didn't happen.
Kelvin Beachum didn't sign.
I thought he and management would work out an extension, and I'm guessing most of the Nation felt likewise. I thought it would go right to the wire, as is usually the case, but I also thought that, as with Troy Polamalu and so many others in recent years, it would happen on the way to the plane or the bus or even Gillette Stadium.
But it didn't. Despite a month of wrangling between Beachum's reps and Kevin Colbert, and despite Colbert clearing out ample cap space just a week earlier, no deal got done. And because of the Steelers' longstanding policy of not negotiating during the season, as soon as that football flew into the air, Beachum basically became a potential -- actually a highly likely -- free agent in the class of 2016.
So, goodbye?
"I'm not thinking like that. I'm just not," Beachum was telling me Thursday after practice on the South Side. "Really, I'm putting it out of my mind entirely. The way I see it, I'm going to play football, and I'm going to keep making myself better."
And in turn, more valuable?
"That, too."
That came with a broad smile from the big man, very much befitting his easygoing manner.
But that doesn't mean there isn't some angst involved. Beachum wanted -- and still wants, I think -- to stay with the Steelers. So the fact that the team was fine with letting him play out the fourth and final year of his rookie contract, one that pays a bargain wage of $1,542,000, doesn't sit well. And it shouldn't. As much money as that is to most of us, an NFL left tackle of his pedigree generally makes $8 million. And he's only one major injury away from ... well, becoming like most of us.
I'm not going to pound a fist over Beachum not becoming unimaginably wealthy, but it's still fair to find it curious that the Steelers wouldn't seize a chance to wrap up the one player on the 53-man roster most entrusted to preserve Ben Roethlisberger's blind side. Beachum is only 26, he doesn't come with much mileage, and Pro Football Focus rated him among the top 100 players in the league in 2014.
Not among the top 100 linemen or left tackles.
The top 100 players.
Beachum scoffs every time I bring that up -- "Come on, man!" -- but even if he were just an ordinary left tackle, he'd be worth a high price as Ben insurance alone.
Yes, if Beachum were extended at anything approaching market value, the Steelers would have the NFL's most expensive offensive line. Maurkice Pouncey, David DeCastro and Marcus Gilbert will count almost $25 million toward the 2016 cap. Either extending or replacing Ramon Foster will add to that. It's a huge chunk of change.
But again, Beachum's specific role makes him worth it, even if comes at the expense of someone else. And it's not as if the Steelers don't grasp this, or they wouldn't have engaged in extension talks in the first place.
Maybe this will come up again in the offseason. It certainly should.
Until then ...
"I'm all about the 49ers," Beachum said. "I've got a job to do, and I've got to get better at it."
• The mood in the Steelers' locker room was about as upbeat as I've seen in a while, and the source of most of that was ... James Harrison?
Not sure if Harrison has taken to heart the team's very public challenge become more of a vocal leader, or if it's something else, but Harrison was almost uncomfortably outgoing Thursday, and all of it positive.
• Martavis Bryant is out of sight, out of mind, apparently, while serving the first two weeks of his four-game suspension.
Todd Haley would barely touch a question about him Thursday:
Whatever's at the root here -- and there's plenty more than this -- the Steelers need to move past the punitive phase once Bryant is allowed to practice again. What he did was dumber than dumb, but he's far too valuable in this setting for resentment to linger.
• No one among the Steelers' newcomers has won over more fans on the inside than DeAngelo Williams, partially for his attitude in coming in as supporting cast for Le'Veon Bell but mostly for his running.
"What a pleasure it is blocking for him, the way he's hitting the holes, the things he's making happen," Foster said. "To think we've got two of these guys."
Maybe best of all, Williams and Bell appear to have forged a friendship and mutual trust that often is missing when players are sharing a position. That could help Bell on and off the field. It's certainly an upgrade over cruising McKnight Road with LeGarrette Blount.
• Criticizing Chris Coghlan's slide into Jung Ho Kang is tantamount to wishing for a new rule and nothing more. Per the existing rule, he did nothing wrong and, honestly, other than the emotion involved, I can't understand anyone disputing that.
If you want to understand why the Pirates and their manager and everyone else would absolve Coghlan, it's simple: They do it, too. Every day. And they want no part of negative labels being attached to them the next time they do it. Which just might be Friday night in Los Angeles.
Trust me, they preach hard slides the same as the other 29 teams.
There's this, also: What's seen in baseball circles as a dirty slide is one in which spikes are raised. Everyone's guilty of that at some point or other, too, but it's still seen as dirty and worthy of retribution. Coghlan's spikes are never raised, and the only contact with Kang's knee was made by his own knee.
The result was awful and unfortunate.
If anyone wants it to be illegal -- or an act demanding that the Pirates counteract somehow -- they'll need to advocate for a rule change. Because until that rule is changed, the Pirates will be sliding exactly the same way.
• Neal Huntington has spoken a lot about the loss last week of one of his top baseball men, Marc DelPiano, to the Marlins. But here's what he hasn't said: DelPiano might well have saved Huntington's job.
I wrote two years ago for the Trib about the discovery of Jason Grilli, a column that focused almost as much on DelPiano and his many contributions to what the Pirates have achieved the past three seasons. Among those were the strongest and most influential recommendations to go all-out to acquire A.J. Burnett and Russell Martin, perhaps the two additions most fairly credited with the transformation from losers to winners.
Huntington still has to pull the trigger, so he deserves his own marks. But if DelPiano is wrong, Huntington would have been fired, I believe, given all the losing that came before, given how all the terrible drafting was about to be exposed, and given the unprecedented money that was put into those two players. As it was, DelPiano was sensationally right, and Huntington and everyone else got extended.
I could say a lot more here. I won't.
If the Marlins use DelPiano properly, they've landed themselves a rising star.
• No, it wasn't DelPiano who recommended J.A. Happ. I asked and didn't get a specific answer, other than that it wasn't DelPiano.
• Fully expect Sidney Crosby to work just as hard to connect with Phil Kessel off the ice as he will on it. Well before Kessel arrived in Cranberry, the captain was asking all kinds of questions about Kessel's preferences, interests, background, etc. He wants this to work.
• Scoff all you want about Sergei Gonchar making the Penguins. I'm hearing he just might, albeit in a taxi-type role. If he does, that would work fine for a guy turning 42 next spring. By then, the grind of the 82-game regular season will have worn everyone else down, and all his skill -- especially the power play and breakout -- can operate on an even keel.
Seriously, why throw that away if he fits under the cap and would be a spectacular fit in the locker room?
• It's been largely assumed that the Penguins' second defense pairing would have Derrick Pouliot with Ian Cole. That's certainly logical per the depth chart. But don't underestimate how much Mike Johnston liked what he saw last season of Pouliot's interaction with Ben Lovejoy. (And I'm referring to the regular season, not before Lovejoy was rammed onto the top pairing and blistered by everyone.)
If Johnston prioritizes allowing both Pouliot and Cole to join the attack -- and Cole looked plenty comfortable there -- then it makes sense to split them. Worth watching.
• Beau Bennett's bigger, stronger and healthier, based on recent workouts in Cranberry, and he's shooting the puck with more authority than ever with finally healthy wrists. I'd be the last to forecast something positive from this, so consider this just sharing.
• Closing with baseball this week, it's hard to put into words how popular and respected Kang has become in the Pirates' clubhouse, but maybe this slice Clint Hurdle shared with me in St. Louis a few days ago will suffice: "There's a temptation to think we have all the answers about baseball in America. It's our game. It was born here. We perfected it. But I've been watching Jung Ho do things differently since the first day of spring training, and my eyes are open, believe me. We don't have all the answers. This is someone who was a star in his country and now has come here and shown us that his way can work anywhere."