Steelers Pro Bowl guard Alan Faneca expects to move on when the NFL’s free agency period begins on Friday. Faneca told the Pittsburgh Post Gazette that nothing was happening between his agent, Rich Smith, and the Steelers meaning Faneca is done after a decade in the Black & Gold. Faneca said the team did make a last-ditch effort to sign him in August before the season began and had brief discussions with his agent recently but no deal was struck. The Steelers placed the Transition tag on lineman Max Starks and will have to pay him $ 6.8-million dollars next season if they can’t work out a long term contract with him.
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smortas
February 26, 2008 at 1:28 pm
Alan will be greatly missed. I had hoped the Steelers would have found room for him to stay. From the business aspect, spending a lot of money now may not seem worth it. I hope the younger guards can play well enough to keep the steelers a potent running attack. I think Alan will be missed by fans who not only appreciated his fine play but his work with the community. It was unfortunate that words were exchanged last year and I think Alan is being unfairly judged. As much as we want to believe the Rooney’s are great citizens, they are businessmen first; Franco Harris, Rod Woodson and quick downplay of spygate (ask the coaches if taping the other guys signals might have evened up those losses to New England) shows that the organization moves on, hopefully without a disaster with the OL.
steelwil
February 26, 2008 at 2:06 pm
Hi Matt,
Seems like the bad blood between Faneca and team owners had helped to shut down any deal for Alan. With this teams O-Line playing as poorly as any team in AFC, the last thing we need is it’s best player to be heading out.
I believe a workable deal could’ve been done. And with Alan back in fold our O-line would’ve had some better options. Faneca might have been able to move into the center position to give Big Ben a stud in front of him for 5-6 years.
Oh well, now we will need to use our draft picks to help try fill this large void.
Thanks,
wil