Steelers quarterback Ben Roethlisberger expresses concern about potential wholesale changes in the team’s offense after the departure of his old offensive coordinator, Bruce Arians, and the hiring of Todd Haley as his replacement. Specifically, he doesn’t want Haley to completely replace Arians’ offense with his own, given how difficult it would be for the Steelers and their wide receivers to learn a totally new system.
“It would probably be easy for him to do,” Roethlisberger said about Haley possibly choosing to stick with his offense. “I don’t know if it would be easy for us to learn it. We’re so young on offense and the most talented room in this whole building is probably wide receiver, no disrespect to anyone else. And they’re also really young.”
“That was my biggest talking point to Mike and those guys — I would hate to just throw everything out and start over because I feel it would set us back two or three years because these guys are just starting to get it.”
Roethlisberger was a big Arians fan, so it’s no surprise that he feels this way. In this case, though, he may have a point — Mike Wallace is already an established star, but a young one, and Antonio Brown emerged as a star in 2011. The Steelers’ offense is far from perfect, particularly along the offensive line, but it has a lot going for it, and it makes sense that Roethlisberger would be protective of some of the Steelers’ talented young players.
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