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Dan Orlovsky never played for the Pittsburgh Steelers. He's not intimately familiar with the leadership style of Ben Roethlisberger, and doesn't claim to personally know general manager Kevin Colbert. With 12 years of experience in NFL locker rooms, though, the ESPN analyst certainly knows a thing or two about the sometimes beneficial and sometimes problematic dynamic between players, coaches, and management, and seems to believe the Steelers' fall on the wrong side of that balance.
Colbert made headlines on Wednesday while defending Roethlisberger amid increasingly widespread whispers that the two-time Super Bowl champion intentionally positions himself above his teammates in the organizational pecking order. Though Colbert's initial comments on Roethlisberger were hardly newsworthy, he later indirectly supported the notions submitted by superstar receiver Antonio Brown and others that Roethlisberger seeks and is afforded preferential treatment over other players.
Article Continues Below“And I honestly believe that [being the leader] can be a burden on him more often than he may like to admit,” Colbert said of Roethlisberger, per ESPN's Jeremy Fowler, “because he has to…he's got 52 kids under him quite honestly.”
Orlovsky, like many others, took umbrage with Colbert calling Steelers players “kids.” He also alluded to Bill Belichick motivating future Hall of Famer Tom Brady through criticism rather than adulation, implicitly suggesting that Roethlisberger's cozy relationship with coaches and management could be one of the factors keeping Pittsburgh from enjoying the sustained success of the New England Patriots.
Bill Belichick cusses out Tom Brady for mistakes in year 19 and Brady owns them. Always saying we we we/I have to be better.
Kevin Colbert the GM of te #Steelers calls Big Bens teammates his kids🤨 while he calls them out through the media😬😬?!???
Just sayin…
— Dan Orlovsky (@danorlovsky7) February 21, 2019
The Steelers missed the playoffs for the first time since 2013 last season, and will be moving on without Brown and superstar running back Le'Veon Bell, both of whom will play elsewhere going forward after growing crossways with the team in 2018.
