Wednesday, April 27, 2011
Associated Press
PITTSBURGH
Safety Ryan Clark showed up for work Tuesday. He left less than an hour later, without getting any work done.
A chat with his head coach? Yes. A face-to-face discussion with the man recently hired as his new position coach? That, too. A sitdown with the Steelers president? He was even able to swing that.
But one thing he nor backup quarterback Charlie Batch did do, was work out.
“Guys are going to come down and do what they can, but we can’t make them allow us to do everything that we want to do,” Clark said. “So you know, you come in, we fought to come into the building, [but] I know I can’t get a workout here, so I’m going to go grab one and come back and talk to [new Steelers secondary coach] Carnell Lake.
“It is what it is, man.”
Clark, the Steelers starting free safety and union representative, hugged Batch, a member of the NFLPA’s executive committee, upon arrival at 8:15 a.m. He then exchanged several friendly greetings as he walked around the practice facility.
He smiled and said hello to Steelers’ team personnel, facility workers and media members he hadn’t seen since the NFL locked out its players some four weeks after the Steelers lost to the Green Bay Packers 31-25 in the Super Bowl.
Clark spoke for less than a minute to reporters as he drove out of the facility on Pittsburgh’s South Side about 9:15 a.m. A gaggle of television cameras and photographers had gathered to see if any Steelers showed up a day after Judge Susan Richard Nelson granted a preliminary injunction blocking the league’s lockout.
Clark told the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette on Monday that he was imploring his teammates to show up Tuesday morning — even if it was going to be more of a statement of solidarity than to actually practice.
Only Batch and Clark were known to have shown up. Batch drove in at 8 a.m., walked up to the facility’s doors but did not enter. He sat in his black SUV until Clark appeared. They walked in together.
Clark chatted with Pittsburgh coach Mike Tomlin as Tomlin sat behind the building receptionist’s counter. When Clark was asked by a media member if he could talk, Tomlin answered for him — emphatically to the negative.
Later, after his discussion with Tomlin ended, Clark was approached again and remained friendly, but politely declined an interview.
“Even if I did,” Clark said, “you don’t want to hear what I have to say, anyway.”
Clark also was seen chatting with Lake, a former All-Pro safety with the Steelers. Clark and Batch then spent some time in the cafeteria, but apparently did not make it into the locker room.