The Pittsburgh Steelers have won their six Lombardi Trophies by building strong defenses and manning the trenches on both sides of the ball. During the early 2000s into the 2010s, they had one of the top offensive lines in football. Those linemen protected Ben Roethlisberger, opened holes for their running backs, and gave the receivers time to catch. They also passed down their knowledge and how to embrace the "Steeler Way" to the younger linemen who came behind them.
Now, Elandon Roberts, a current Steelers linebacker, talks about just how hard it was to go up against those linemen when he was drafted by the New England Patriots in 2016. He recently joined fellow Steelers teammate Christian Kuntz on his show, The Christian Kuntz Podcast. Roberts played for the Patriots through 2019, at which point he followed his former controversial linebackers coach, Brian Flores, down to the Miami Dolphins, where he was their new head coach. Roberts admitted to Kuntz that regardless of how good the Patriots were then (Roberts won two Super Bowls with them), he always struggled with the Steelers' offensive line.
"I had trouble early in my career with Pittsburgh as a whole," recalled Roberts. "That offensive line was just so dominant. [Maurkice] Pouncey, he's the only offensive lineman that I didn't win against, that just gave me trouble every game. Like I used to go to sleep, like, 'Dang, I gotta deal with this guy today.' I remember my last time before he retired, I'm like, 'Yeah, I got something for you today. Like we fitting to do this.' I'm gonna go straight down the middle, and he was ready. I never got Pouncey. We battled the whole game—big respects to Pouncey. I talk about him all the time. Pouncey, [David] DeCastro, you had [Ramon] Foster, Foster was actually good, but they were so dominant that Foster kind of took the weak end of the stick, but he was actually a good offensive lineman."
Roberts faced a line primarily consisting of players like Ramon Foster, David DeCastro, Maurkice Pouncey, and Alejandro Villanueva in Pittsburgh in the mid-to-late 2010s. Pouncey, the Steelers center, gave many defenders trouble. He was a first-round draft pick in 2010 and went to nine Pro Bowls. Despite that line's dominance, they never got a Super Bowl win.
In 2023, Roberts joined the Steelers, it was his eighth season in the league and many were skeptical about his abilities. However, he has proven his value to the team and currently has 118 tackles, 3.5 sacks, 12 tackles for a loss, eight quarterback hits and a forced fumble.
During the recent game against the Dallas Cowboys, he had a leap reminiscent of the legendary Troy Polamalu. He nearly had a take away, but was able to stop the Cowboys on the goal line by forcing the fumble.
The Steelers' Offensive Line Wasn't Elandon Roberts' Only Struggle
Roberts told Kuntz that the offensive line wasn't the only part of the Steelers he struggled with in those early years when he was with the Patriots. When asked who was the toughest player to tackle during his career, he said it was former running back, Le'Veon Bell.
According to Roberts, Bell wasn't just hard to bring down; he was elusive. You would go to tackle him, and one minute, he'd be right there in front of you, and the next second, he was gone.
This isn't a surprise; Bell was special. A second-round pick in 2013, he really showed how good he was going to be during his second season when he had over 2,200 combined yards and made it to the Pro Bowl. His career was rocky, with injuries and suspension, but that did not stop him. In 2017, he had a league-high 321 carries for 1,291 yards along with 85 catches for an additional 655 yards.
