The Relentless James Harrison
By Andrea Hangst
In late August of 2014, linebacker James Harrison decided it was time for retirement. At 36 years old and with his "love for the game [not] strong enough to make up for missing one more birthday or first day of school," as he wrote in his announcement on Facebook about his family, it was time to close out his NFL career. But, the twists and turns of Harrison's career had not come to an end.
Now, he's set to match up against the Bengals on Saturday night in Cincinnati as the Steelers make yet another push for a Super Bowl championship.
It hadn't been for Harrison to get to this point. It took years for him to become the All-Pro, Pro Bowl-caliber pass rushing linebacker who defined the Steelers' defense for the better part of a decade. An undrafted free agent from Kent State, Pittsburgh picked Harrison up in 2002, only to cut him in September, re-sign him at the end of the year and eventually cut and re-sign him two more times before the Ravens signed him in 2004. Baltimore then shipped Harrison to NFL Europe's Rhein Fire in Dusseldorf, Germany … a team that eventually released him as well. Harrison thought that his big NFL dream would not go any further than that, according to a later interview with ESPN's Elizabeth Merrill.
His final chance with the Steelers, coming in 2004 thanks to an offseason injury to linebacker Clark Haggans, saw Harrison double down on his efforts to understand and master coordinator Dick LeBeau's complex defense. And once he did, which did take some time, he proved to be one of the team's most formidable forces on that side of the ball. In 2007, he had 8.5 sacks and made a household name for himself after body slamming Ravens safety Ed Reed in a Monday Night Football contest in which he totaled nine tackles, 3.5 sacks, an interception, three forced fumbles, and a fumble recovery. In 2008, he had a career-high 16 sacks, making him the Associated Press' Defensive Player of the Year. Harrison also had an amazing 100-yard interception return in the Super Bowl to help the Steelers defeat the Cardinals. He had 10 sacks in 2009, 10.5 in 2010 and nine in 2011.
But injuries began to mount, including knee surgery in 2012 that cost Harrison the first three games of the season. And the salary cap hit for Pittsburgh became too high in relation to his production. Harrison turned down a pay cut in 2013 to remain with the Steelers and was released, only to spend the season with the Bengals as an outside linebacker in their 4-3 base defense. It was after Cincinnati cut him -- and some time spent thinking about his situation -- that he decided to hang up his cleats, he assumed permanently.
But then something happened. The Steelers were reeling from numerous injuries on defense early in the 2014 season, including a wrist injury suffered by outside linebacker Jarvis Jones, something that left the team thin at the position (which already lacked depth). In addition, veteran cornerback Ike Taylor had a broken forearm, and rookie linebacker Ryan Shazier had a knee injury. Leadership, depth and ferocity were all in short supply. It was time to try to bring Harrison back.
It took some convincing. Now-retired Steelers defensive end Brett Keisel reached out to Harrison about returning. His response? "I'm good. I'm not coming back." But later that day, Harrison called Taylor (who was fresh out of surgery) and told him that if Taylor said Harrison should come back, he would. Harrison was officially un-retired, re-signing with Pittsburgh less than a month after his Facebook announcement. You might remember this terrific Instagram post that accompanied his decision:
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