Pittsburgh Steelers: James Conner can make Le’Veon Bell expendable
In the NFL, life goes on. The Pittsburgh Steelers are not going to complain about collecting checks from Le’Veon Bell and James Conner can take his job.
In the NFL, life goes on pretty quickly. Even for the Pittsburgh Steelers and superstar running back Le’Veon Bell, who is now forfeiting at least one regular season game check not because of a suspension from the league, but by choice.
Even Bell’s teammates in Pittsburgh are starting to get irritated with his holdout, including some very revealing comments from the guys who have helped pave the way for all of his rushing yards since he was drafted on the offensive line.
While his teammates have had his back in the past, they are apparently fed up.
Steelers offensive lineman Maurkice Pouncey had some pretty select words for Bell. Ramon Foster was even more blunt.
This raises a serious question of whether or not Bell is going to be with the Pittsburgh Steelers this season at all.
He’s willing to forfeit over $850,000 in a single game check to not be with the team right now, so what do the Steelers do from here? Will bringing him back be a bad idea for their locker room culture? Would a team actually trade something for him at this point?
The Steelers have a back they are very high on in former Pittsburgh Panthers star James Conner. His teammates with the Steelers believe in him.
Conner was an outstanding runner at Pitt and had an incredible journey, beating cancer, coming back and having a phenomenal senior season before becoming a third-round pick of the Steelers.
If Conner is able to have a big game against the Browns, the Steelers’ leverage gets stronger. They already offered Bell a guaranteed one-year contract, but he understandably doesn’t want to keep working on a year-to-year basis. He feels he’s done enough in the league to earn a long-term contract, and he most definitely has.
But the Steelers have been unable to come to terms on a long-term agreement with their star back to this point and now, they have to be looking for ways to make him replaceable.
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It’s doubtful they would trade him this season, but you never know in the NFL. We just saw Khalil Mack traded a week before the start of the NFL regular season.
Watch for Conner this weekend to have a big game against the Cleveland Browns. If he is able to do that, we’ll see what kind of impact it will have on Bell’s decision to continue holding out or return to his team.