NFL: Futures of Ben Roethlisberger, Tony Romo and other quarterbacks in flux

Ben Roethlisberger of the Pittsburgh Steelers looks on from the sideline. Al Bello / AFP

The Super Bowl is still more than a week away, and this Sunday’s Pro Bowl is too much of a yawn fest to merit attention.

At least there are quarterbacks to drive the news cycle.

The NFL’s glamour boys need only utter a curious comment about premature retirement, be mentioned as trade bait or simply demonstrate an interest in self improvement to generate a juicy round of reporting, analysis and speculation.

Take Ben Roethlisberger. The long-time Pittsburgh Steelers field leader followed a disappointing loss in the AFC Championship Game, and a generally lacklustre offensive showing in the post season, by hinting he may not come back.

The 34-year-old quarterback has three years and US$64 million (Dh235m) remaining on his contract, so it seemed extreme when he told a Pittsburgh radio station he was going to “take some time to evaluate next season, if there is going to be a next season”.

Fortunately, there were media voices to explain what he really meant. The general takeaway: Big Ben was expressing his frustration at the coaches, in particular offensive coordinator Todd Haley.

Haley’s once-explosive offence has lost its big-play identity, relying less on Roethlisberger’s arm and more on talented running back Le’Veon Bell’s legs.

In any case, the consensus was that Roethlisberger will return, but the same cannot be said for all the coaches.

Kirk Cousins of the Washington Redskins was not as dark, even though he surfaced as a possible trade candidate. The emerging star was given the franchise tag at $20m last year. If the organisation tag him again this season at $24m, instead of signing him to a long-term deal, he would be a free agent in 2018.

In that case, the speculation went, Washington might want to trade him to make sure they got something before he left.

“Ultimately, it’s not in my hands,” Cousins told NFL.com, adding that he loves Washington, but would not mind finding a happy home elsewhere.

You would be smiling, too, at his kind of valuation. In any case, Washington president Bruce Allen tried to end the speculation by promising on a scale of 1-to-10 that “it’s a 10” that Cousins stays put.

Not that the story will go away. After all, Cousins is a quarterback.

Meanwhile, the saga of Tony Romo bubbles on, even though loquacious Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones said he finally was finished discussing his $24m backup quarterback.

Ever since the increasingly fragile Romo was injured last summer, then lost his job to impressive rookie Dak Prescott, Romo’s next chapter has been a meaty media guessing game.

Silence from the Dallas camp has not stopped the conjecture. This week pundits named the Houston Texans and the Denver Broncos as the best “fits” for Romo, assuming he would be willing to scale his contract down.

Even happy quarterback news works. Cities on both coasts recently heard from their young hopefuls, last year’s No 1 overall pick Jared Goff and No 2 man Carson Wentz, who struggled as rookies.

Goff said he was eager to play in Los Angeles Rams new head coach Sean McVay’s stretch-the-field offence. Wentz offered always-grumpy Philadelphia Eagles fans a dollop of optimism when he announced he had hired a private tutor to doctor up his throwing mechanics. Not earth-shattering news, but when quarterbacks speak, headlines appear.

Then there was Deshaun Watson of Clemson, one of the few college quarterbacks considered a potential first rounder in the April draft. When he announced he would not play in this week’s Senior Bowl, a key stop in the pre-draft evaluation process, pundits roared, pro and con.

Even a future NFL quarterback doing nothing is news.

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