In the world of the NFL and the Pittsburgh Steelers, it’s all about instant gratification and winning now. Anything short of a Super Bowl championship is unacceptable. Many things have changed during the Super Bowl era including free agency and the wide-open offensive style of play. However, when it comes to winning a title, two things remain the same. You still need stability and talent.

The Steelers are the epitome of stability. First, Primary ownership has remained within the Rooney family. Secondly, they’ve had just three head coaches in the last 49 years. As far as talent goes, the Steelers don’t have quite enough of it to win it all. That’s why it makes sense for the Steelers to bring back Antonio Brown and Le’Von Bell. All the stability in the world means nothing if you lack the talent to go with it.

Do you want a roster full of choir boys or championships

There seems to be this mistaken notion that the Steelers championship teams were all high-character choir boys. That all were selfless team first guys. Never mind that Mean Joe Green once walked out, intending to quit, during the 1974 season. Remember when Franco Harris, Mike Merriweather, and Hines Ward held out for more money?

Terry Bradshaw was also quite the diva himself. Remember when he defied team orders and had unauthorized surgery on his elbow under an assumed name? Remember how much he cried about needing attaboys from Chuck Noll instead of criticism? How about when Mel Blount sued Noll. Those teams had as many internal distractions as the current team. They just did a much better job of keeping things in-house.

Just imagine how much more we would have known about those guys if social media existed back in those days. Perhaps fans would want to run those guys out of town on a rail. Fact is, no team is perfect. Every team has distractions. Brown and Bell are no different, or worse than those guys mentioned above. Each is one of the very best in the game and makes the Steelers better.

The championship window with Ben Roethlisberger is closing

Parting ways with Brown and Bell hurt the Steelers in the short term and put them further away from winning a seventh Super Bowl. When that is the ultimate goal, adding talent is the answer, not shedding it. The Steelers have roughly a two-year window to win it all before Ben Roethlisberger calls it a career. Brown and Bell are two of his best offensive weapons with and without the ball in their hands. Roethlisberger needs them, not inferior replacements. Their presence opens things up for everyone else as well.

Down to the wire

To those wanting the Steelers to dump Brown and Bell, would you rather brag about having a roster full of choir boys who are sometimes competitive? Or would you rather brag about a team that can win the Super Bowl in any given year? The best in the league will always want paid, and will always have diva qualities. Having said that, the players in that locker room would love to have Brown and Bell back. Why? Because they like those two.

They also know that having Brown and Bell gives the Steelers a much greater chance at accomplishing their ultimate goal, hoisting another Lombardi Trophy. The bottom line is that having some of the best talent in the world often comes with a price. Teams that want to be great will find a way to deal with it. Teams that don’t will settle for a roster full choir boys and the mediocrity that will go with it. For the purposes of winning a championship, bringing Brown and Bell back seems like a much better option.