San Francisco Gate columnist Drew Magary didn’t hold back on his apparent hatred for Steelers quarterback Ben Roethlisberger and his complicated legacy.
In the piece filled with insults, Magary even goes after Steelers fans essentially calling them dumb.
“Steelers fans wrote "THANK YOU BEN" on very large placards, proving that they had at last mastered spelling the name BEN after 18 seasons,” said Magary.
Magary’s frequent attacks on Roethlisberger included calling him, “a d*ckhead”, a “bastard” and even says, “Ben Roethlisberger sucks. God, he sucks. Just THINKING about him sucks. I wish he’d never been born.”
Beneath the vulgarity, Magary brings up Roethlisberger’s array of off-field transgressions: accusations of sexual misconduct, stories of harassing service workers, his infamous motorcycle crash from 2006.
There’s no excusing any of that alleged behavior. The NFL rightfully suspended Roethlisberger after he was accused of rape in 2010.
Roethlisberger ultimately wasn’t charged in that case, and reached a settlement with a separate woman who accused him of rape. But Magary focuses on the Roethlisberger’s early career while ignoring the benevolence he’s displayed over the last decade.
As The Fan’s Ron Cook points out in the Post-Gazette, Roethlisberger was the Steelers’ 2013 nominee for the Walter Payton Man of the Year award, an honor given to players who exemplify good behavior on and off the field. That was the first sign of Roethlisberger’s personal turnaround, and on Monday night, we witnessed the end result. Most fans lingered at Heinz Field in freezing temperatures long after the final whistle to give Big Ben a hero’s send-off.
“This is home,” Roethlisberger told reporters afterwards. “I was born in Ohio, but I live here and I’ll always be here. These fans and this place mean so much to me and my family and always will. I’ve always said they’re the best fans in all of sports, and I’ll stick by that until the day I die.”
In recent years, Roethlisberger has positively impacted the community just as much as he’s impacted the Steelers. The Ben Roethlisberger Foundation supports police and fire departments throughout the U.S., and also works with the Make-A-Wish foundation. The foundation has distributed in excess of $2.2 million since 2007.
But of course, none of those good deeds found their way into Magary’s column. Instead, the former Deadspin writer rehashed all of the old strikes against Roethlisberger, in a painfully transparent attempt to rile up Steelers fans.
While Roethlisberger’s past transgressions cannot be ignored, Magary’s piece would’ve been more constructive if he had toned down the vitriol and anger to make his case.
And for the fans that were on hand at Heinz Field on Monday night, they were celebrating the football player that Roethlisberger was on the field. Football is an important part of living in Western Pennsylvania and the thousands of fans on Monday were saying thank you to a man who gave them so much to cheer about over the best 10 years.
