Pittsburgh Steelers

Rooney: 'I've been through years a lot worse'

PITTSBURGH — Channel 11’s Alby Oxenreiter sat down with Art Rooney II on Thursday to get a fresh perspective after some of the comments the Pittsburgh Steelers owner made to other media throughout the week.

Rooney had previously said and confirmed to Channel 11, that all options are open in regard to wide receiver Antonio Brown, except giving him his outright release.  But Oxenreiter asked Rooney if there was a scenario where he could see Brown returning to the team.

"As we sit here today we still have almost two months before there's any decision that can be made or implemented, so we are not going to close any doors," Rooney said. "Obviously there would have to be a lot of conversation with Antonio about the commitment he has to the team and the organization and so as I said before, it's a little hard to envision right now, but you never know."

Asked what would happen if he couldn’t get the right value in trading Brown and had to keep him, Rooney said it’s too early to speculate on what may happen during the trading period.

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But situations like this are not new to Rooney. He threw out a bunch of names from the past when asked about how he deals with these situations.

"There's no question down through the years, we've dealt with a lot of situations with players going back to Ernie Holmes' situations and contract holdouts,” said Rooney. “We've had contract holdouts by Mel Blount, Jack Lambert, Franco Harris, Rod Woodson, Hines Ward, these things happen in sports. So you just have to be able to deal with it, and at the end of the day we have to make the best decisions for the team."

Alby Oxenreiter also asked about what seemed like contradictory statements. Coach Mike Tomlin said the culture needs to change.  Rooney had said earlier this week it’s a winning culture.

When asked if it was a mixed message, Rooney said: “I think overall the culture that we have is good, the track record that we have with this culture is pretty strong. I don't get a sense from Mike that we need dramatic changes in the culture. There's areas we need to improve on, and every year there are areas we identify that we need to improve on and so we'll be looking at that in this offseason and  try to come out of this offseason with a team that's ready to compete again next year."

In earlier interviews, Rooney scoffed at the notion that the team is a circus. So Oxenreiter asked for some clarification.

“It's hard for me to analyze why people are using certain words," Rooney said. "I can only say we didn't accomplish our goal this year, but we came pretty darn close. We came down to the last few plays of the season and finished a half game out of winning the division. Unfortunately I've been through years where we were a lot worse and weren't even close to winning our division, so I've seen worse years than this. I feel good about where we are and we need to get better this offseason and I think we're capable of doing that."

On other topics, Rooney confirmed that signing quarterback Ben Roethlisberger to an extension is a priority, the door isn’t closed on running back Le’Veon Bell, he would like to see more balance in the offense, and the kicking game needs to improve to put the team in a position to win more games.

The final message from Rooney to the fans: "We've been through worse times and hey, I just thank our fans for their passion and support and I think the vast majority of them have confidence that we're gonna work hard and be back out there next year trying to compete for a championship."