After the police investigation, the N.F.L. suspended Roethlisberger for the first six games of the 2010 season, the first player to be suspended under the league’s personal conduct policy without having been charged with a crime. The penalty was later reduced to four games. That season, Roethlisberger led the Steelers back to the Super Bowl, where they lost to the Green Bay Packers.
Both allegations made against him came years before the N.F.L. sought to strengthen its response to allegations of sexual assault and partner violence, and before the #MeToo movement brought attention to accounts of assault and harassment. It is impossible to know if different timing would have changed how the cases against Roethlisberger were handled — either legally, by the N.F.L. or by sports media — only that those who consider his legacy now do so in a very different climate.
Roethlisberger’s hint at retirement resulted in his receiving a home send-off at Heinz Field in Week 17 against the Browns, a win that kept alive the limping Steelers’ playoff chances. Thomas Tull, a minority owner of the team, took out a full front page ad in the Sunday edition of The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette thanking the quarterback, and Roethlisberger did a postgame lap around the stadium to salute fans. His wife, whom he married in 2011, and their three children met him in the tunnel afterward.
During the “Monday Night Football” broadcast, ESPN color commentator Brian Griese made a reductive reference to Roethlisberger’s being “immature” and having made “mistakes” early on, adding that the fan base “forgave” him. This effort to sanitize his farewell was, at best, an oversimplification. There is no easy way to juxtapose two sexual assault allegations with the 18 years Roethlisberger bolstered the Steelers with his play, but both are part of his N.F.L. career.
A person’s legacy isn’t always neat and tidy, and the same goes for endings. With one play left in Kansas City, Roethlisberger completed his last pass, but his target, tight end Zach Gentry, was tackled short of the end zone. The Steelers could no longer stop the clock, and the final seconds ticked away.