Rashard Mendenhall: Steelers RB Deserves Condemnation, Not Release

Rashard Mendenhall Tweets Shouldn't Lead Steelers To Cut RB

Pittsburgh Steelers running back Rashard Mendenhall angered a lot of people with his tweets on Osama Bin Laden and 9/11.

Everyone who is outraged has every right to be. Everyone who agrees with Mendenhall has every right to. And Mendenhall has every right to keep his job.

Steelers team president Art Rooney II released this statement to the media after the backlash began.

"

"I have not spoken with Rashard so it is hard to explain or even comprehend what he meant with his recent Twitter comments....The entire Steelers organization is very proud of the job our military personnel have done and we can only hope this leads to our troops coming home soon."

"

Given Rooney's comment and the Steelers recent display of willingness to chastise and even banish their stars because of "unacceptable" behavior, the question has to be asked: Will the Steelers cut ties with the suddenly controversial 23-year-old starter?

After all, in 2010 they traded away Santonio Holmes, because of yet another arrest/lawsuit problem, less than 18 months after he won the Super Bowl MVP.

And after Ben Roethlisberger's pair of rape accusations led to a four-game suspension in 2010, there were rumors that the Steelers seriously considered trading or even cutting their two-time Super Bowl-winning franchise quarterback.

But lumping Mendenhall in the same category as either Holmes or Roethlisberger is way off base.

He broke no laws...except for maybe the law of common sense: you probably don't tweet about 9/11.

Granted, Roethlisberger was never arrested, so maybe he didn't break any laws (we'll never really know the truth there) either, but he certainly walked a fine line and it was his "repeat offender" status that really cost him with the fans, ownership, the media, and Commissioner Goodell.

More to the point, it sets a really dangerous precedent for a team to make player personnel decisions based purely on their personal beliefs, no matter how unpopular or how uninformed or even how ridiculous they might be. It's a slippery slope.

Down the road, could a team owned by a Catholic family cut a player who supports abortion? Could a team with a pro-gay-marriage owner release a player who speaks out against gay marriage?

And anyone who goes down the road of "he showed bad judgment so he will show bad judgment on the football field too" is really reaching. Peyton and Eli Manning showed poor judgment by being in those Oreos Double Stuff League commercials, and no one questioned their perceptive abilities. 

Teams cannot regulate what's inside a player's head. As long as they don't break the law or violate the rules mandated by the team and/or league players have a right to express themselves politically or socially however they want even if it does reflect poorly on the team.

I'm reminded of that disclaimer you occasionally hear on TV: "The views expressed by _______ don't necessarily represent those of this station or it's parent company."

That should be sufficient. But ever since Goodell opened the door with the "personal code of conduct policy" we are all subject to its interpretation.  Which, unfortunately, isn't very clear.

Who's to say that Mendenhall's statement reflects more or less poorly on the NFL and his team than what Holmes or Roethlisberger or Michael Vick or Donte Stallworth did? Well, apparently the Steelers front office and the Commissioner.