Bob Labriola
In a preface to “Dan Rooney: My 75 Years with the Pittsburgh Steelers and the NFL,” former Commissioner Paul Tagliabue wrote, “Dan Rooney’s life has been dedicated to the Pittsburgh Steelers and the National Football League …”
Tagliabue might’ve added a 3rd entity: Ireland.
The NFL has introduced that the Steelers will host a recreation in Dublin, Ireland, as a part of their 2025 common season schedule, and amidst all the pleasure and anticipation surrounding that it needs to be famous it will not be the primary time the Pittsburgh Steelers can have performed in Croke Park.
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That event was described this fashion by Michael McQuaid within the July 23, 2023, version of the Irish Star: “It was a day to remember for any NFL fan on the island of Ireland. American football fans witnessed a historic event as the Pittsburgh Steelers faced off against the Chicago Bears at Croke Park in Dublin on July 27, 1997. This exhibition game was part of the NFL’s American Bowl Series, which aimed to promote the sport internationally and establish a global fan base. Little did they know that this exhibition match would leave a lasting impact, not only on the players and fans who experienced it firsthand but also on the trajectory of American football’s global growth.”
“Well, No. 1, I thought it was great attendance for a preseason game,” stated President Art Rooney II, “and great enthusiasm in the stands. The Irish are great sports fans. They love their sports, whether it’s hurling or rugby or Irish football, just a country that’s into sports. It was great to see how much the Irish people enjoyed American football. It was a good game, and it was a lot of fun.”
It was lots of enjoyable, definitely essentially the most enjoyable ever for an addition to what on the time was already a 4-game preseason. And there was much more planning and preparation concerned than regular for a preseason recreation.
One of the primary issues to be completed was line up an opponent keen so as to add a fifth preseason recreation to its schedule, and that needed to be negotiated from team-to-team as a result of in 1997 the league workplace did not deal with the preseason schedule because it does at the moment. Dan Rooney was in a position to persuade the McCaskey household – then the homeowners of the Chicago Bears – {that a} preseason recreation in Ireland was a good suggestion.
Then got here the duty of growing plans for the journey.
First, it is vital to know how an NFL crew usually travels to a highway recreation, be it preseason or common season. Arrive by constitution to the location of the sport the day earlier than kickoff – Friday earlier than a Saturday recreation; Saturday earlier than a Sunday recreation; Sunday earlier than a Monday recreation – and board buses on the airport to go on to the crew’s resort. There the touring occasion is housed and fed, and the place conferences are held and any closing preparations for the sport are launched. Travel to the stadium for the sport, after which typically 5 hours after kickoff, the sport has been performed, interviews completed, gear gathered and packed, and it is wheels-up for the constitution flight to deliver the crew dwelling.
This recreation in Dublin, this preseason opener, this opener of a five-game preseason was something however typical.
Both groups arrived in Dublin per week earlier than the July 27 recreation, and members of the family had been among the many touring occasion. In addition there was a big group of Steelers followers that traveled individually to Dublin for what amounted to per week’s trip in Ireland with Dan Rooney because the host.
And what higher host than a person who in 1976 co-founded The Ireland Funds, with its “trinity of goals – peace, culture and charity,” the identical man who would function the United States Ambassador to Ireland, from July 2009 till December 2012. Such was Dan Rooney’s love for each his sport and Ireland that through the annual July 4 celebration on the grounds of the U.S. Embassy he modified the day’s main exercise to a recreation of flag soccer from what all the time had been a recreation of softball.
In 1997 the week included a soccer clinic that includes Steelers gamers squeezed in round their observe schedule, and bear in mind, these practices had been part of the early section of coaching camp. For the “vacationers” there have been team-provided excursions of Waterford Crystal, Northern Ireland, Dublin Castle, and Phoenix Park. There was a “pub crawl” that launched the Americans to a number of the nightlife to be discovered within the Temple Bar space, a riverside neighborhood with cobblestone streets. Closer to the day of the sport, there was a barbeque for each groups in Ballsbridge.
A private spotlight for me got here on our first night time in Dublin. Dan Rooney had organized a visit for the media to Johnnie Fox’s Pub, described this fashion on its web site: “Johnnie Fox’s, situated in Dublin, is one of the oldest pubs in Ireland, and steeped in history since 1798. Renowned for being the highest pub in the country, nestled in the peaceful township of Glencullen and surrounded by the beautiful scenery and serenity of the Dublin Mountains. Johnnie Fox’s Pub was originally a small holding farm that became a “secure haven” during the great Irish rebellion of 1798 against British Rule in Ireland. Despite the revolt ending in British victory, the year of 1798 marked a significant watershed in Irish history.”
The journey there was scenic, bordering on breathtaking, and a bit horrifying as a result of the mix of the mini-bus touring on very slender nation roads on the climb into the mountains was a world away from driving east on Route 30 towards Saint Vincent College. Arriving at Johnnie Fox’s, it was as if we had traveled again in time. There was a big peat-burning hearth that was heating the pub, and although it was late July it was chilly up within the mountains. The Irish had used peat for hundreds of years to warmth their houses and cook dinner meals as a result of it was an inexpensive various to coal and pure fuel.
Beside the friendliness proven to us by the regulars, the spotlight was the Hooley Show, a commonly scheduled little bit of dwell leisure that paired conventional Irish musicians performing with Johnnie Fox’s Irish Dancers. My recollection was that it was an up-close-and-personal model of what was recognized within the U.S. on the time as Lord of the Dance. The expertise and persona of the performers that night time was off the charts.
But again to the sport.
“If you recall, in the 1990s the only NFL international games being played in those days were preseason games,” stated Art Rooney II. “We had played in Barcelona (against the 49ers in 1993), in Tokyo (against the Chargers in 1996), in Mexico City (against the Colts in 2000) to be in front of an international audience. Of course, being in Ireland was something a little more special to us and my Dad and our whole family.”
It was no easy matter getting Croke Park to host Steelers vs. Bears as a result of in 1997 there by no means had been a non-Irish sport performed on that area/pitch. But as a result of it was Dan Rooney, it wasn’t not possible, both.
“I don’t think there had to be a lot of arm-twisting, but it was unusual for Croke Park to host a different kind of event,” stated Art Rooney II. “But through being involved with the Ireland Funds for so long, my Dad had a lot of great friends at the GAA (Gaelic Athletic Association) that owns Croke Park. The GAA sponsors the major Irish sports – hurling and Gaelic football – and while there are matches all over the country the major ones in those sports end up at Croke Park.”
Also through the run-up to the sport, there was a photograph op the place the Waterford Crystal Trophy was on show, and amongst these in attendance representing the Steelers had been Dan Rooney and his spouse, Patricia, and Coach Bill Cowher. The approach Dan Rooney remembered it, after seeing and being impressed with the trophy, his spouse sidled as much as Cowher and stated one thing like, “I really like that trophy. We better win this game.”
As for the main points of the sport itself, I bear in mind Kordell Stewart beginning at quarterback and taking part in fairly nicely; and Jerome Bettis, who was coming off a 1996 season the place he rushed for 1,431 yards, with a 4.5 common and 11 touchdowns, and who had signed a 4-year contract value $14.4 million that offseason as an unrestricted free agent, not solely taking part in however taking part in lengthy sufficient on this additional preseason recreation to attain a landing.
Put all of that beneath the class of “message received,” as a result of Mrs. Rooney’s trophy sits in a case as a part of a show contained in the UPMC Rooney Sports Complex.
More info:
Official NFL Release Steelers FAQ Official Dublin Game Site