The good news is, the Steelers have a healthy Le’Veon Bell, Antonio Brown and Ben Roethlisberger together for the playoffs.
The bad news is, no one knows how long that will last, in the short term or the long.
With Bell set for another year of free agency after playing out his franchise tag and Roethlisberger a steady source for offfseason drama after last year’s retirement musings, there’s an acknowledgement that any of these games could potentially be the last for the trio.
“We understand we have a great group here,” Bell said, via Jeremy Fowler of ESPN.com. “We don’t know if everybody is going to be back or if we’re going to be that special next year. The time that we do have, we have to make it all count. Everybody in this locker room understands that, so we have to go out there and do it.”
Bell and Brown combined for 3,479 yards and 21 touchdowns this year, and Roethlisberger threw for 4,251 yards this season. Brown didn’t mention kicker Chris Boswell, who ought to have Killer B status, but he’s a restricted free agent so they can squat on him.
Roethlisberger said this week he wasn’t approaching it as his last home game at Heinz Field, but after last year’s equivocating, it’s hard to know.
Of course, the Steelers could still play another game there, if they beat the Jaguars and the Titans upset the Patriots. Which doesn’t seem likely, but then again having two AFC South teams in the divisional round wasn’t really #asexpected either.