{"id":755394,"date":"2026-02-16T05:54:15","date_gmt":"2026-02-16T05:54:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/755394\/"},"modified":"2026-02-16T05:54:15","modified_gmt":"2026-02-16T05:54:15","slug":"art-rooney-ii-must-be-a-happy-man","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/755394\/","title":{"rendered":"Art Rooney II Must Be A Happy Man"},"content":{"rendered":"

Friday, news broke the NFL won its arbitration case over the NFLPA that would prevent the union from formally issuing annual team report cards.<\/a> Ones that often offered scathing reviews of teams, especially of owner Art Rooney II and the Pittsburgh Steelers.<\/p>\n

Though the report cards and feedback will still exist behind-closed-doors and likely and inevitably leaked out, Rooney must\u2019ve been happy about the NFL\u2019s big win.<\/p>\n

Am\u00a0I\u00a0happy about it? Heck no. Transparency is always a good thing. The NFL seemingly won on a technicality of the reports not capturing a fully accurate picture, though I\u2019m not sure how that\u2019d even be achieved without every player vote being shared, but the league has no interest in fixing the system and keeping them public. The more hoops required to share them to the outside world, the better it is for the league.<\/p>\n

After the 2024 season, Pittsburgh ranked 28th out of 32 teams<\/a>. Rooney\u2019s personal grade reflected the same. A year earlier, he was named second-worst owner.\u00a0<\/a><\/p>\n

It\u2019s impossible to know if Rooney made a private push to get the NFL to squash the report cards. It\u2019s logical any owner and franchise regularly criticized to want the cards to go away in such a public and formal setting. A list of 11 team complaints<\/a> cited in the official ruling left out Pittsburgh. Perhaps Rooney didn\u2019t make a comment or did so covertly.<\/p>\n

Maybe it didn\u2019t need to be said. Roger Goodell is smart enough to know anything that makes owners and teams look bad should be addressed.<\/p>\n

Previously, Rooney shared skepticism over what the reports had to say. In 2023, he struck a more conciliatory tone about their value.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re always open to ideas [about] what we need to improve,\u201d he told reporters.<\/a> \u201cI think we have an open-door policy with our players and things that they see that they think we can improve on.\u201d<\/p>\n

After another year of negative marks, Rooney\u2019s comments turned harsher.\u00a0<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cIt doesn\u2019t get presented to us; it gets presented to the media,\u201d he said. \u201cSo as far as I\u2019m concerned, it\u2019s a media opportunity for the players association as opposed to a serious effort of constructive criticism.\u201d<\/p>\n

But Rooney, like the other 30 owners (excluding Green Bay, since the organization doesn\u2019t have an official person in that role) had to listen. Minor as they are, Steelers\u2019 facility upgrades have occurred. The locker room received a refresh and more equipment was brought in. It\u2019s possible the team undergoes a larger renovation when their lease expires at the end of the decade. Pittsburgh may even find a new location to practice given their current plot of land simply being too small for any major expansion.<\/p>\n

Based on Friday\u2019s ruling, all criticism can happen behind-the-scenes. Rooney\u2019s ostensible glee isn\u2019t his alone. Every owner was happy about the ruling.<\/p>\n

Some will get leaked. But a leak and an official \u201cunveiling\u201d being able to compare and contrast grades all at once are different. Any negativity on future reports won\u2019t carry the same weight or impact. It\u2019s bad for transparency but good for business, which is Goodell and the NFL\u2019s ultimate goal.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Friday, news broke the NFL won its arbitration case over the NFLPA that would prevent the union from…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":755395,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2055],"tags":[4393,7,6,520,57,2360,426,691],"class_list":{"0":"post-755394","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-pittsburgh-steelers","8":"tag-art-rooney-ii","9":"tag-football","10":"tag-nfl","11":"tag-pittsburgh","12":"tag-pittsburgh-steelers","13":"tag-pittsburghsteelers","14":"tag-steelers","15":"tag-trending"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/116078763730586179","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/755394","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=755394"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/755394\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/755395"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=755394"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=755394"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=755394"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}