Facility rooms are the place where players spend most of their time except for fields. And it is a very common expectation that these should be hygienic, spacious, and comforting. But most of the time, this is not the case. When the NFL Association Executive Director visited the Ravens facility on September 12, 2024. He shared his views on the medical attention given to Ravens’ linebacker, Kyle Van Noy. 

When Van discussed the delay in medical treatment at the Chiefs‘ facility room to check the fracture in his orbital bone. Howell said, “I think this was an unfortunate situation where that did not occur,” via Jamison Hensley of ESPN.com. And continued, “Thank God for Kyle’s situation [that] it wasn’t worse. But here we are with the first game of the season; we have many more games to play. We just can’t have that.” Mentioning that the necessary parties are aware of the ways to improve and work on the problems. But this conversation extended to discussing Steelers’ facility room. 

Pittsburgh Steelers have been practicing at UPMC Rooney Sports Complex for over a decade. But in the last few years, the complex has received poor feedback. It got worse in February 2024 when the NFLPA did a survey that revealed how the players were disappointed by the facilities provided to them. The weight room received a grade of C, ranking 24th out of 32 teams, while the training room was graded a D+, placing 29th. Surprisingly, these were among the team’s higher marks, as the overall report highlighted concerns about the Steelers’ resources.

However, after a long time, NFLPA Executive Director Lloyd Howell Jr. visited the Steelers facility room again on September 10th to discuss potential improvement. In an interview with Reporter Joe Rutter, he discussed he has been trying to improve the practice complex, but because of some issues, this has not been possible until now. 

But what could be the issue? It is really a problem or Steelers’ owner is being ignorant of the issues players are facing?

What does Steelers’ Owner Rooney have to say about the improvement?

NFLPA is not the only organization that has raised questions about the condition of practice rooms. Mark Kaboly from The Athletic rode to the Steelers and also discussed it, saying, “The locker room stinks. Let’s not sugarcoat it,” Kaboly began. “It’s small, it’s outdated. The whole facility is not very good. I don’t think Art is a guy who is not willing to put money into it. He put $10 million into the weight room eight years ago.” Saying a lot of things need to happen when it comes to facilities, and one of them is space in the rooms. 

But the Steelers owner does not seem happy with these reviews. And when people talked about it, he got mad and made icy comments. He said, “I haven’t met too many players that are architects yet. We’re not opposed to player feedback. Look, we do look at what are the benchmarks around the country, what players need to be successful these days.” and mentioned that they are working on the improvements and that all these reviews and comments are unnecessary.

But now, after the situation is being monitored, there might be improvements in the practice rooms. The question that arises is: Can the lack of proper facilities and the disappointment within the team impact their season?