From Christopher Barbre, at SteelerNation.com:

In a recent interview with the Two Percent Podcast, Ramon Foster talked about Roethlisberger’s mindset on everything and how it translated to the gridiron.

“[Have] you ever met somebody that whether you’re playing basketball in a garbage can, ping pong, cards, throwing darts, that they just win? That was Ben [Roethlisberger]. That ability to win was huge. He led with a ‘watch me play’ type of mold, like those types of dudes. He wasn’t real rah-rah, you know, how most quarterbacks would be?”

Whether the officials are on your side or not, you have to do everything you can to win. Roethlisberger would take all kinds of extra hard hits because it took all that extra work, just to bring him to the ground. That tough mentality didn’t mean that the offensive line had an easier job; it meant the exact opposite. His lines had to grind more and work harder to make sure he didn’t end up taking an extra shot to the body.

The Steelers already have a great rah-rah guy with Mike Tomlin, so they need someone that can lead by example for that balance. Roethlisberger’s tough play and improvisational skills were the kind of attributes that the team needed to see. No play was ever truly a “dead play” to him; there was always a way to get something positive out of any situation that looked bad.

That kind of leadership and “endless grind” mentality led to Roethlisberger having 41 career fourth quarter comebacks, which is third in NFL history. The only other quarterbacks ahead of him are arguably the two greatest quarterbacks of all-time: Peyton Manning and Tom Brady. It takes a lot of leadership to routinely come back from any sort of deficit, and Roethlisberger’s leadership helped his teams get those ugly wins.


You can read more from Christopher Barbre here. You can also watch Ramon Foster’s full interview here.