Mark Madden stories, Page 28

Tom Brady retired. But not yet. If he waits until Feb. 4, Brady gets a deferred signing-bonus payment of $15 million. Tampa Bay could try to recoup some or all of that. But the Buccaneers likely feel Brady delivered proper value. Brady earned about $293 million playing football. But we...

The Steelers’ coaching staff under Mike Tomlin used to be dotted with name assistants like Bruce Arians, Dick LeBeau and Mike Munchak. Now it’s populated by comparative no-names at picayune salaries. It’s the lowest-paid coaching staff in the NFL. The offensive coordinator’s job went from Arians to Todd Haley to...

Some odd things are happening in the Pittsburgh Penguins’ orbit. On Wednesday, the Penguins signed Jeff Carter to a two-year contract extension worth $6.25 million. The timing is quirky. The Penguins have more significant decisions to make regarding impending free agents, namely Kris Letang, Evgeni Malkin and Bryan Rust. If...

David Ortiz hit 541 career home runs. Barry Bonds hit 762. Ortiz had 1,768 RBIs. Bonds had 2,558. Ortiz hit .286. Bonds hit .298. Ortiz was a DH. Bonds won eight Gold Gloves. Ortiz never won an MVP. Bonds won seven. Ortiz flunked a steroid test in 2003. Bonds never...

At 39, Ben Roethlisberger was one-and-done in the playoffs. At 38, Aaron Rodgers did the same. Rodgers quarterbacked a better team, got a first-round bye and had home field. Do you still want Rodgers to be the Steelers’ next quarterback? You shouldn’t. These playoffs feel like a changing of the...

Detroit won its last Stanley Cup in 2008, kept its core together too long and aged out. Los Angeles won its last Stanley Cup in 2014, kept its core together too long and aged out. Chicago won its last Stanley Cup in 2015, kept its core together too long and...

The three most important positions in football are quarterback, cornerback and left tackle. The Pittsburgh Steelers are woefully underinvested at those positions. Rookie Dan Moore Jr. did a creditable job at left tackle. But he is a fourth-round pick. Pegging him as the long-term solution at that crucial position is...

The Steelers’ season-ending 42-21 wild-card loss at Kansas City offered no surprises. The Steelers told you, once again, who they really are. Now you’ve got no choice but to believe them. Plenty of criticism is rightly being heaped on the offense, which indulged its habit of not scoring a first-half...

The likeliest way for the Steelers to beat Kansas City in Sunday’s wild-card playoff game is for the Chiefs to play horribly while the Steelers get lucky. That’s not very likely. If you’re looking for a more precise route — but one that’s even less probable — the Steelers must...

The Pittsburgh Penguins just had a 10-game win streak. Jake Guentzel just had an 18-game points streak. Behold the majesty of 12 consecutive refreshing Penguins notes. Never stop never stopping! (Except the Penguins and Guentzel both got stopped.) • No one said Evgeni Malkin’s return would disrupt the Penguins’ chemistry....

These last two weeks have been like fantasyland for Yinzer Nation. Maybe the worst team of the Ben Roethlisberger era rode the quarterback’s scattered, almost random heroics to claim the AFC’s second-ever No. 7 playoff seed at the end of perhaps the most improbable Sunday in NFL history. It was...

Ben Roethlisberger did it. I’m not sure how. But he did it. I’ve written this column many times. Barring an even bigger miracle next weekend at Kansas City, this will be the last. (Don’t forget Sunday’s real heroes: 3-14 Jacksonville upset Indianapolis, and Las Vegas kicked instead of kneeling.) But...

It’s tough to guess what the Pittsburgh Steelers’ offseason plan will be. Will they tear it down and start a drastic rebuild? Or do they think they can contend, and so mostly tinker and adjust? Here’s betting the latter because that’s how the Steelers think. That makes deciding about defensive...

This year marks the third in four that the Steelers will miss the playoffs, barring an upset by Jacksonville. In those seasons, they’ve won eight, 12, eight and nine games. The Steelers haven’t reaped the benefit of winning, say, four games. Finish middle, draft middle, stay middle. It’s difficult to...

Nobody should have sympathy or even concern for Antonio Brown after his epic meltdown and early exit during the third quarter of Sunday’s Tampa Bay Buccaneers-New York Jets game. We reap what we sow. Knock off amateur diagnoses like suggesting Brown has CTE from a vicious head shot he suffered...

It was the best of times, it was … well, not quite the worst of times. But even as Ben Roethlisberger went out a winner in his last game at Heinz Field, his performance underscored that it is, indeed, time for the Pittsburgh Steelers quarterback to retire. Roethlisberger was 24...

Mike Tomlin is fond of saying he wants volunteers, not hostages. That rationale has seen LeGarrette Blount, James Harrison and Melvin Ingram depart Pittsburgh because they were unhappy. Keeping Blount in 2014 and Ingram this season would have proven useful because of injury above them on the depth chart. But...

The Pittsburgh Penguins have a seven-game win streak. Now they also have a five-game postponement streak. The NHL schedule is being decimated by covid. Canada isn’t wholly to blame, but that country’s fear of covid and much stricter policies concerning the virus are trickling down to the entire NHL. That’s...

The Pittsburgh Steelers have many problems, and they are great. But problem No. 1 is their defense against the rush. The Steelers rank last in the NFL in that department. They allow an average of 143 rushing yards per game. Cleveland is the Steelers’ next foe. The Browns rank No....

In October, the headline on my column trumpeted, “T.J. Watt worth every red cent.” That’s still true — when he plays. But Watt is hurt a lot. Watt played sporadically in Sunday’s 36-10 loss at Kansas City. He reportedly has cracked ribs. Watt had one tackle and zero sacks. He...

The NHL was supposed to resume its season Monday. That’s been pushed back to Tuesday. That postpones Monday’s game between the Penguins and host Boston. The Penguins are next scheduled to play at Toronto Wednesday. But the Maple Leafs had 13 players with covid as of Friday. There are also...

Thursday was the 49th anniversary of the Immaculate Reception. It’s an iconic moment in Pittsburgh sports for a plethora of reasons. It’s got a catchy name. A fan coined it; it was popularized by the late sportscaster Myron Cope. It was thought to launch the Pittsburgh Steelers’ dynasty in the...

T.J. Watt of the Pittsburgh Steelers should win the NFL Defensive Player of the Year award. Watt should be a lock, in fact. But Watt has missed two games and parts of three others. That shouldn’t hurt him, but it might. The most basic ability is availability. (It seems Watt...

If there’s such a concept as a “discouraging win,” the Steelers might perfect it. That mess against Tennessee on Sunday was more about the Titans being determined to lose, not the Steelers deserving to win. The Steelers got four takeaways, turned them into just four field goals and could have...

Pascal Dupuis was a nondescript talent before playing on a line with Sidney Crosby. Skating with Crosby made him a legit top-six winger. Chris Kunitz was average before playing on a line with Crosby. Skating with Crosby turned Kunitz into a first-team NHL All-Star and Olympic gold medalist. Crosby can’t...