Stop me if you’ve heard this one before.  The Washington Redskins have acquired a veteran who was once a Pro Bowl caliber star but has since fallen victim to age and numerous injuries.   No, I’m not talking about Donovan McNabb.  Although congratulations, Philly, you’ve finally ran off the most successful signal caller in your franchise’s pitiful history so you can have a different quarterback to hate for no reason.   And he’s never even sexually assaulted anybody!

Back to things of interest to the Pittsburgh Steelers, former starting RB and Super Bowl XL hero Willie Parker has also signed with the Redskins.  Fast Willie joins a crowded backfield with Skins mainstay Clinton Portis and the also recently signed Larry Johnson.   I guess building a team with young hungry athletic players is for those fools who actually know what they’re doing.   Nobody wins the offseason like Danny Snyder wins the offseason!

Sadly, FWP leaves the Steelers with bitter feelings as this article illustrates. Willie has always been an angry person so this isn’t surprising.  Whenever the Steelers appeared on Monday Night Football, FWP always gave the name of his high school when introducing himself.  He actually went to North Carolina but they buried him on the bench which he always blamed for him going undrafted.  That he held on to that hate even after becoming the heir apparent to Jerome Bettis, scoring a big contract, and setting a Super Bowl record for longest TD run shows that he’s a man who knows how to hold a grudge.

Another Super Bowl hero, Santonio Holmes is now facing charges in the assault case I wrote about two posts down.   That case continues to get odder and odder by the day.  The police initially closed the case because the victim, Anshonae Mills, declined to press charges.  She says she was pressured by the cops to let the incident go.  Police accounts are she huddled up with ‘Tone and then told them she was not pressing charges, which sounds like he made some monetary promises he didn’t keep.  Meanwhile, Holmes is not only denying he threw a glass at her but claims another woman did the deed.

In the midst of this chaos, Santonio has become a Twitter addict.   Firing off dozens of messages every day, Holmes continues to show what a high quality education he received at THE Ohio State University.  If not for my trusty Ebonics-to-English dictionary, I wouldn’t be able to decipher half of his incoherent ramblings.   What I could decipher is the message above, wherein he tells somebody who scolded him for yet another brush with the law to go drink some Drain-O.   Classy guy.

Considering the character of people the Steelers have on the roster at the moment, I guess I shouldn’t be surprised.

It is officially the worst off-season ever for a fan of the Pittsburgh Steelers.

Earlier today, a lawsuit was filed by a woman in Orlando who claims that Super Bowl XLIII MVP Santonio Holmes assaulted her at a nightclub earlier in the month.  Stop me if any of this sounds familiar.  She alleges that her and her college-age friends where hanging with him in the VIP section of the Rain nightclub when a stupid argument between her and ‘Tone ended with him throwing a glass at her face.   Not the booze in the glass, mind you, THE ENTIRE GLASS.

What an idiot.   Everybody knows you take your groupies back to the private VIP bathroom before you assault them.   Has your fearless leader taught you nothing?

Yes, much like our douchebag quarterback, Ben Roethlisberger, Holmes has a long history of being a troublemaking asshole.  He has three kids from two different mothers, neither to whom he’s married.  One of the baby mamas called the cops after he choked her, slapped her, and then threw her around.   She dropped those charges most likely when Mr. Green (aka cash money) found his way into her bank account.  On the plus side, he’s also been arrested for drug possession and disorderly conduct three separate times so not all his offenses are violent.

I already know what some of the comments are going to say.  “Ack!  Another lying ho looking for money!” or something along similarly misogynistic lines.  I guess she may be lying.  Although it seems a little odd to me that of thirty-two NFL teams and all their active players, most of whom are rich and famous, why is it that the same two Steelers keep getting accused of doing things they shouldn’t be doing?

Right now, I’m absolutely embarrassed to be a Steeler fan.  And anybody who lives in Pittsburgh, grew up in Pittsburgh, or has the faintest inkling of what it means to be a true Steeler fan has to feel just as sick as I do.  Over the next month or two we’re going to see exactly what kind of people Dan Rooney and his son Art II truly are.

Dan Rooney is the Ambassador to Ireland largely because he built up a reputation of being a man of strong character who runs his organization in a responsible and classy fashion. There’s a reason he has a sterling reputation while guys like Jerry Jones or Al Davis are laughingstocks. But this team has quickly become the joke of the NFL, full of criminals and idiots that reflect directly on him, his family, and his city of birth.

Time to start earning your reputation, Dan.  The time for sitting on your hands and turning a blind eye to these goofs on your team is over.  Start getting things under control or everything the Rooney name has stood for since the late great Art Rooney was in charge will be lost forever.  As a proud Pittsburgher, I can’t tell you how tragic that would be.