Ben Grimm (Not The Thing)

[THE ILK]

Ben Grimm

Jason Keidel

New York, NY (WFAN) -- Ben Grimm is a comic book character, a member of the Fantastic Four otherwise known as “The Thing,” renowned for brawn but lacking in oration.

That’s what Ben Roethlisberger has become: a caricature, body by God and mind by Cable Guy, a walking straight-line who is a sad symbol of the modern athlete.

Big Ben is back in town to drown us in bromides. He’s a new man. Ben called an audible yesterday. But rather than do it before his offensive line and 50,000 fans, he hid behind a lawyer’s pen, issuing a statement through the Steelers. Ben starts this drive from his own goal line.

“The Commissioner’s decision to suspend me speaks clearly that more is expected of me,” Ben wrote, according to The Associated Press.

Incomplete pass. It’s a sad beginning to state that the world expects more from you than you expect from yourself, Mr. Roethlisberger.

Only thing new about Ben is his latest scripted apologies festooned with predictable platitudes. Big Ben is sorry because his big arm was caught elbow-deep in the jar. He should have thought of consequences when he staggered, bombed, behind an underage girl, equally imbibed, into a five-by-five bathroom with one toilet for a classy turn of spin the bottle.

Frankly, he is trash who is treasured for his golden arm and a contract that eviscerates salary caps. The cold calculus of pro sports forbids the righteous Rooneys from taking Roethlisberger on a symbolic trip on The Stugots, whacking him on principle despite his principal.

I inhale black and exhale gold, so I was naturally chaffed when I heard about the six-game suspension. How can a man be given time when he did no crime?

Because the NFL has to stop this and these misogynistic, juiced-up behemoths who wield their fists and other ravenous organs against women. We’re tired of celebrating the hero’s left hook on Sunday while ignoring the right hook he gives his wife on Monday.

Ben is on the wrong end of a movement and a man who has to knock the crime rate down in his league.

Two rape allegations and a motorcycle wreck (sans helmet to protect the two brain cells he has left) have become as much of Ben’s bio as the spiral he threw to fellow alleged felon Santonio Holmes. Mr. Holmes was given a one-way ticket to Palookaville to audition for a chubby chief who likes his boys with big mouths.

The Jets gleefully snagged Santonio, thus discarding all pretense of a character-first football squad – a team ready for hard knocks, on and off the camera. But Gang Green has at least a superficial excuse for eschewing personality in its personnel – a four-decade hunger strike from the Super Bowl. The Steelers have ample bling and no excuses.

The folks defending Roethlisberger suffer from the same myopia crippling the Tiger apologists. “It’s between Tiger and his wife,” they say. Sure. “It’s between Ben and that girl. Only they know what happened.” Sure.

Tell that to the boy with the putter practicing his fist-pump in a red shirt, or the boy lost in the cornfields near Findlay, Ohio, pretending to duck the blitz while Hines Ward finds a slice of open grass.

I was a kid when Joe Greene tossed his jersey to that boy in the Coke commercial. Perhaps I’m becoming what I once loathed – that old man swathed in nostalgia, fondly reflecting on times when athletes were something to behold rather than belittle.

We can talk about Ben’s bodyguards, erstwhile cops who should have put the cuffs on the QB before his misguided jaunt to the latrine, or Willie Colon for blowing his lone chance to not get flagged for holding.

We can blame Roger Goodell, the new Hugo Chavez of football, whose powers seem only surpassed by Galactus.

But then I realized I was literally blinded by laundry. After a moment of thought I knew I was accusing the accuser, rather than going to the source, No. 7. Even the guys with two rings won on Ben’s broad shoulders don’t have his back.

Bill Cowher, the sideline-spitting coach never known for diplomacy, couldn’t shoot a reporter straight when asked about Ben’s popularity among his teammates. “I think we like anybody that can help us win football games,” Cowher said, according to USA Today. “I think there’s no question that this guy, on the football field is tremendously respected by his teammates and he’s respected by his opponents…The bottom line is trying to win football games.”

There it is. Just win, baby. Vince Lombardi said winning is the only thing, but his Packers did it under religious and familial ethos. Look at his players after the team dissembled – nearly all of them gentlemen, rich in every sense.

But surely Terry Bradshaw, Ben’s dynastic predecessor in Pittsburgh, is sympathetic. “I hardly ever went in a club – ever – in 14 years in Pittsburgh,” Bradshaw told Yahoo! Sports. “Count ‘em on one hand. I was petrified of the problems you can get into.”

Well, Terry surely loves Ben as a person. “Our relationship isn’t any good,” Bradshaw continued. “When I told him to park the motorcycle, he got pissed. All right? Then he had the accident. And since then, you know…he doesn’t like me, and I’m learning not to like him.”

Ben needs a character witness, and he can’t find one. Granted, it’s tough to play in a time where every move is run through x-ray machine of the 24/7 news cycle. But the machine needs to glean some good. Ben, it seems, has none.

Even the most jaded football fans have a threshold. Beer goggles are starting to steam up with each charge against Ben Roethlisberger. Just five years ago a Steelers fan could rest his head on his Terrible Towel knowing that win or lose they played a game in a manner that made Papa Rooney proud.

Karma is, well, you know. As each game is played with Ben on its payroll, the Steelers are making deals with devils that they can’t rescind. There’s been a slow drip on America’s soul that has heretofore avoided the confluence of the three rivers. Cut him.

That’s right. Cut him. It’s a poor business move but the karmic justice doesn’t have boundaries. The Steelers have a brief window through which they can throw out their trash. And while one man’s garbage could be another man’s gold, Ben Roethlisberger no longer deserves to wear black & gold.

Remove Big Ben and the Steelers are looking at six wins. I’ll take it. I’ll take Charlie Batch and six noble wins over Paul Bunyan and the myriad social bunions that make him too ugly to watch on too many levels.

Feel free to email me: Jakster1@mac.com

Pretty good take if you ask me. http://www.wfan.com/Ben-Grimm/6908591

[JoeWillie]

This guy is well on his way down the road to ruin.

Just a matter of time.

[rick34125]

right because you and I know that if he was in some kind of radioactive science laboratory mishap he would become a supervillain not a super hero.

[Thai Jet]

He still has a chance to turn it around. Hopefully this wakes his butt up.

[Bruce Banner]

Rape charges didn't kill Kobe Bryant's career, I don't see why people expect Roethlisberger to disappear.