B/R

PITTSBURGH — If you're a Steelers fan, maybe you groaned and grumbled and threw your Terrible Towel across the room when Le'Veon Bell turned his contract offer down.

No penny-pinching season ticket holder wants to hear about a player, their player, saying "no" to a deal that would have made him the highest-paid at his position in the NFL.

But this was different. This time, you armchair quarterbacks with the salsa stains on your jerseys weren't alone. Contemporaries were also scratching their heads. LeSean McCoy told B/R in August that, sure, Bell wants to change the market, but "that would've changed the market."

McCoy would've signed that deal.

Sitting at his locker shortly after a herd of cameras has moved on, Bell is told just that. He looks ahead without blinking.

"I feel like it was a good number," the Steelers running back says. "It just wasn't my number."

Let Bell explain.

"I feel like there's more to football than fun," he says. "Don't get me wrong: I want to have fun. I enjoy it. I love it. At the same time, I want the value that I feel I should be valued at. Somewhere close. We didn't meet where I expected, so it didn't work out."

That's why Bell sat out all of training camp and the preseason before begrudgingly signing a franchise tender worth $12.1 million for one year.

Make no mistake: Le'Veon Bell still wants to spark a revolution.

Last January, Bell announced to the world that he is the Steph Curry of the NFL. Exactly how Curry's deep threes forever changed basketball to its core—from youth leagues to JV to varsity to the NCAA to the NBA—Bell believed his (borderline-nauseating) patience would forever change the running back position.

Maybe it will, maybe it won't. Either way, taking a five-year deal worth $12 million annually would have made him a revolutionary figure in the way running backs are paid.

Or underpaid, more accurately.

The average salary for an NFL running back is around $1.5 million, good for 18th of 20 positions as Spotrac divides them. Only fullbacks, those dinosaurs plodding in front of them, and long snappers make less. Kickers and punters average more dough. And whereas five running backs average $7 million per season, 19 left tackles, 25 cornerbacks and 14 tight ends make that much.

Fresh off a season with 1,884 total yards and nine touchdowns in 12 games, Bell may be the top-paid back in the league, but his annual salary ranks 54th among all players. McCoy is second among running backs and 116th overall.

Top-Paid RBs Player Cap hit Rank among RBs Rank in NFL Le'Veon Bell $12.12 million 1 54 LeSean McCoy $8.88 million 2 116 DeMarco Murray $6.95 million 3 185 Lamar Miller $6.50 million 4 205 Jonathan Stewart $6.18 million 5 222 Spotrac.com

So Bell sat out, fired off cryptic tweets, refused to budge. It's his mission to take a sledgehammer to this market.

And he'll do so the only way he knows how.

With that trademark patience.

"I know the things that I can do, versus other backs, and versus other players," Bell says. "When you're playing the game of football, there are certain things you can coach and certain things you can't really coach. You just have to kind of know it. There's a lot of tools that I have that weren't coached—I just know it.

"That's what separates me. … I'm different because there are things that I do that can't be coached."

Through three games, there were only flickers of such uncoachable greatness. On one 2nd-and-8 against Minnesota, Bell was met by Brian Robison three yards deep, planted north, hurdled a diving Linval Joseph and then toted 273-pound Everson Griffen on his back for a nine-yard gain. Offensive guard Ramon Foster helped him up, and Bell, with next-to-no emotion at all, signaled first down.

The next game, he was stuffed at the goal line and somehow plowed through a wall of Bears defenders for his first touchdown of the season.

Still, Le'Veon clearly was not Le'Veon. He was more Antoine Walker behind the arc than Steph Curry, averaging 3.5 yards per carry. Rust was expected and rust is obvious, but losing to the lowly Bears is not revolutionary.

While you may have seen a spinning wheel buffering above Bell's name on your fantasy lineup, Bell never did. Leading up to this second lethargic performance, he locked eyes and assured he can still perform the way he did last January.

Then sure enough, this past Sunday he bashed through the rival Ravens 39 times for 186 total yards and two scores.

He's back.

He never expected the recalibration with his offensive line to take too long.

That patience? "You can't coach that." Nobody else can do what he does.

Just ask him.

"People go out there and try to duplicate it and be patient, but they don't actually know what I'm doing or why I'm being patient," Bell says. "I can't even explain what I'm doing, because every run is like a snowflake. They're all different.

"We could call the same exact run versus the same exact defense, and the run will look different. That's just the way it's going to happen. Every run is a snowflake, and I don't think I can coach somebody how I run."

Granted, coming to a complete stop behind the line of scrimmage initially infuriated his offensive linemen.

Facing his locker, Foster thinks back to when he first blocked for Bell and rolls his eyes.

"In the beginning," Foster says, "it kind of pissed you off. I don't want to say, well, yeah, it did. Like, 'Dude, just hit the f--king hole!' … You get to the point where you say, 'So and so should have this run. This is a run for him.'"

Nam Y. Huh/Associated Press

Yet after 1,000-plus carries, including the postseason, the Steelers linemen grew to realize Bell's style infuriated defenders much, much more than it did them. Foster points to one of Bell's runs against the Jets last season in which an overzealous Darron Lee shot frontside only for Bell to cut backside.

He saw Lee's face. The linebacker was visibly demoralized.

"He'll set us up to where we know if we hold and hold and hold our block, the 'backer will shoot right side and Le'Veon will cut backwards," Foster says. "We end up pinning 'em, and here he is for a 15-yard run. … He saves us more than anything. So as much as we may complain about it, it's one of those things where he's a mad scientist.

"I think I heard a story of Todd Gurley trying to do it one day in a game, and he got his ass blasted and it was like, 'No, that ain't for you.'"

The reason it seems these linemen have eyes on the backs of their heads is because they've learned how to read the eyes of linebackers. They can tell precisely when Bell is waiting and when he'll accelerate off their body language. The result? Poetry in motion last postseason. A 167-yard masterpiece against the Dolphins. A 170-yard mashing of the Chiefs.

Foster calls Bell "a joystick," a talent on par with Antonio Brown who can "win you games by himself," and "if you have a 2nd-and-6, he'll get you frickin' 35 yards. That's huge."

Across the locker room, Joe Haden remembers that other perspective. The longtime Brown admits Bell has juked him silly before and, no, he doesn't see anyone else even attempting to run the ball the way he does. What we're seeing right now, he believes, is something special. This is David Johnson. LeSean McCoy. Adrian Peterson in his prime.

"Those dudes are special," Haden says. "You just can't give them the ball and think someone else can do what they're doing."

With respect to Shady and AP, two potential Hall of Famers, Bell plans on leaving a more profound legacy. He plans on inherently changing the game. Star players so often freak into damage control after making the proclamation he did last winter—Bell's candor is refreshing.

Bell doesn't retreat, no, he doubles down. Months later, he repeats he's "definitely" having a Curry-like effect on his sport.

Steph is different, and so is he.

Steph "lives and dies" by the three, and Bell will live and die with his patience.

"Because it's something I can always adjust," Bell says. "If they're being patient to me, I can be even more patient. I've got the ball in my hands. I'm controlling the tempo. So I always feel like as patient as you think you are, I'm always going to be able to control the tempo."

Yet therein lies the problem. The tempo most teams seek is fast—is putting the ball in the air all game. Even Haden douses his praise of Bell with this cold reality.

Early on, coaches taught Haden to clutch receivers' jerseys out of their breaks. Grab low. Grab cloth. Now, there's no getting away with contact at all. Corners can only mirror receivers as, each year, officials clamp down more and more on defensive contact. So if it's harder than ever to cover receivers, why wouldn't NFL front offices pour more money into quarterbacks and receivers?

In 2010, nine quarterbacks attempted 500 passes. In 2016? Twenty.

In 2010, six backs averaged 20 carries per game. In 2016? Two.

Bell knows the numbers, but he also sees a different big picture.

At his locker, he dives into a passionate testimony.

"I want to be a guy who sets the market for running backs," Bell begins. "I feel like running backs don't get the value we deserve."

Gregory Shamus/Getty Images

Because one of the two teams with the 20-carry back was Dallas, which went 13-3. Because the other was Pittsburgh, which made the conference title game. Because Atlanta, with the league's fifth-best rushing attack, was a centimeter away from rings and immortality. All three valued the run; all three were rewarded.

Bell's voice gets louder, and louder, explaining that running the ball keeps your defense fresh and limits possessions. You're in control when you choose to win five…six…eight…17 yards at a time. Bell absolutely knows why the Falcons blew that 28-3 lead, too.

Their MVP quarterback, inexplicably, dropped back to pass when he shouldn't have.

Their defense, after 93 plays, was rendered a collection of 11 zombies.

Their lead, shockingly, disappeared.

"If they just run the game out, they can just run the time out," Bell says. "If you have a good running game, the time's gone! Tom Brady doesn't have the possessions to come back."

So, yes, Bell believes Pittsburgh would have beaten the Patriots in the AFC Championship if he didn't leave with a groin injury.

"I definitely think so," he says. "I bring another dimension to the game. Ben [Roethlisberger] would have another weapon, another guy he can just hand the ball off to. We got AB going downfield last year. I'm underneath. It's hard going up against that, against the guys in this locker room. We have a lot of playmakers and a great offensive line. So if I'm playing and part of the game, it'd make it that much more and we'd come out with the W."

The goal is to get that shot again.

To face the Patriots—or whomever—with a trip to the Super Bowl on the line.

And if he plays, runs wild and pisses off defenders? Maybe then Le'Veon Bell gets that magic number he seeks and nobody views the running back position the same ever again.

Tyler Dunne covers the NFL for Bleacher Report. Follow him on Twitter: @TyDunne.