It’s finally done.
The Pittsburgh Steelers have finally signed quarterback Ben Roethlisberger to a contract extension and the deal is expected to be officially announced very soon, according to Gerry Dulac of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. It is expected to be the final contract of Roethlisberger’s long career that started in 2004 when he was selected 11th overall by the Steelers in the first-round of the 2004 NFL Draft out Miami of Ohio. That momentous event happened 15 years ago today.
Tuesday night, Adam Schefter of ESPN reported that the Steelers were hoping to get Roethlisberger signed to a contract extension prior to the start of this year’s draft after failing to do so before his $5 million roster bonus was due him three days into the new league year.
Following up on the report of the deal being done, Schefter reports that the extension is for two-years and thus will tie Roethlisberger to Pittsburgh through the 2021 season. The Steelers quarterback had one-year remaining on his old contract that called for him to earn a $12 million base salary in 2019 in addition to his $5 million roster bonus.
We’ll start passing on the details of the contract as soon as the numbers become available. If indeed it’s a two-year extension, however, the Steelers aren’t likely to clear much, if any, salary cap space in 2019 as a result of it. Roethlisberger entered Wednesday set to count $23.2 million against the team’s salary cap in 2019 with $6.2 million of that being previous bonus proration.
It’s worth noting that the contract of Steelers backup quarterback Mason Rudolph, who was drafted in the third-round last year, is also currently set to expire after the 2021 season, like Roethlisberger’s.
UPDATE: Early numbers associated with Roethlisberger’s extension:
UPDATE $37.5M signing bonus for Ben:
