We’ve previously heard from players grousing about playing in London, with some saying saying they’d rather quit than have to go there on a regular basis, and some Jaguars acknowledging multiple games would hurt them.
But if it was just one game, and it was in Dublin, Ben Roethlisberger said the Steelers would be all-in.
Steelers owner Dan Rooney is just home from a three-year stint as the U.S. Ambassador to Ireland, and has talked about playing a game in his ancestral land for years. And Roethlisberger said regardless the logistical challenges, he’d do it out of respect for his boss.
“I would like it for him,” Roethlisberger told Brendan O’Brien of the Irish Examiner. “That’s how much he means to me and I think everyone on our team would say that. Even if guys said they would never want to play in London, 100 percent of the guys on our team would say they would play in Dublin for Mr Rooney. I’d do it for him.”
Of course, not every team is owned by a man held in such esteem in the locker room, so Roethlisberger’s views may not hold in other places.