In the seventh round in the 2009 NFL Draft, the Pittsburgh Steelers selected A.Q. Shipley, a hometown product who went to Moon High School before playing his college football at Penn State. While the prospect of playing for his hometown team was initially a dream come true for Shipley, he quickly realized that it wasn’t the picture-perfect scenario that it seemed. During an appearance on NetWorth with offensive lineman Justin Pugh, Shipley said that getting drafted by Pittsburgh ended up being the worst thing for him.
“It was a dream come true. It was like, that’s where I wanted to be. Mike Webster was the epitome of, when I became a center that’s where I wanted to be,” he said. “And then you got all the history of Pittsburgh centers with Mike Webster, Dermontti Dawson and then Jeff Hartings before that when they won the Super Bowl. And I get there and I’m like, ‘Oh this is gonna be great.’ And then it was the worst thing for me. I’m back home, I’m back home in a comfortable environment, I’m back home around my family, I can kind of lean on them. And I’m one of the guys that like, I do best when I’m away from everything. When you put me in a dungeon and I have to focus on something, that’s when I do best.”
Shipley said he was routinely going out with his buddies from home, which he “probably” shouldn’t have done, but “you live and you learn.” After spending the entire 2009 season on Pittsburgh’s practice squad, he decided to sign with the Eagles even though the Steelers wanted him back. Shipley said the Eagles were slated to take him a few picks after the Steelers, and while he didn’t play for the Eagles, when Ryan Grigson, the team’s director of player personnel, got the general manager job with the Indianapolis Colts, he signed Shipley. That gave him his first NFL experience, as he started five games and played in 14 for the Colts in 2012.
Shipley went on to play eight seasons in the league, four with the Arizona Cardinals, two with the Colts and one each with the Baltimore Ravens and Tampa Bay Buccaneers, starting 72 games out of the 110 he played in. From a pure talent evaluation standpoint, it was a great pick by the Steelers in the seventh round of the draft. But it’s a risk when you take a hometown player that he’s going to almost have too much of a support system around him that focusing on football might not be as important.
Shipley deserves credit for recognizing that as good as it might seem to be playing football in your hometown surrounded by your friends and family, it might not have been the best thing for his career. Who knows if his career would’ve been the same had he stayed with the Steelers, and by leaving and going out on his own, he developed into a quality starting center in the NFL.
During his time with Pittsburgh, he did have Bruce Arians as his offensive coordinator, and Arians went on to be his offensive coordinator with Indianapolis and his head coach in Arizona and Tampa Bay. So he was able to at least form the basis of a relationship that ended up being a fruitful one for him in Pittsburgh, and he ended up working as an offensive assistant for Arians in Tampa Bay after his retirement.
It’s interesting to hear Shipley’s perspective on playing for his hometown team, and it’s likely something that’s more common than we realize. While it makes for a good story, sometimes it’s better for guys to get out of an area they’re familiar with and grow on their own without their friends and family right around the corner. It worked out for Shipley, and while it was a loss for the Steelers, it was certainly the right decision for his football career.
