Purple Heart Recipient Ex-Steelers RB Rocky Bleier Among Military Veterans Honored In Charles Esten’s Halftime Show

Matt Fitzgerald·
CULTURESPORTS
·
Steelers fans
@steelerscr

The Pittsburgh Steelers have as illustrious of a franchise history as any team in the NFL, but as part of the league’s Salute to Service initiative, Sunday’s halftime show by Charles Esten highlighted a story that really blew my mind.

Esten just debuted his first country studio album Love Ain’t Pretty this January, but you could tell he was thrilled to be able to share a very special collaboration with a certain U.S. Army veteran.

Before we get into some of the performance itself, let’s examine the man at the center of it all. Rocky Bleier got drafted by the Steelers back in 1968 out of Notre Dame and played his rookie season in Pittsburgh. Then, the Vietnam War hit. Bleier put his football career on hold, and volunteered to serve his country. He was a specialist in the U.S. Army, and he nearly lost his life.

As is documented in a very detailed account on Notre Dame’s athletic department website, Bleier’s unit was attacked in a rice paddy. He suffered a wound from a machine gun in his left leg, and then took shrapnel from a grenade. To quote a direct passage, “the grenade that exploded at Bleier’s feet…left his right leg quivering uncontrollably, his right foot maimed, his pants full of blood and his flesh riddled with shrapnel.”

Not only did Bleier live to tell the tale. He came back to play for the Steelers after all that. His first season back was lost as he recovered from one hundred shards of shrapnel removed from his leg and foot. Bleier was considered 40% disabled by the U.S. Army. None of it mattered; he just kept fighting, rehabbing, and was a key contributor on four Steelers Super Bowl-winning teams after several years of barely hanging on to his NFL career.

Very few men can say they were awarded the Purple Heart and Bronze Star Medal military honors, and have four Super Bowls to boot. In fact, I venture to guess nobody has achieved such things.

What’s most remarkable to me is that Bleier successfully got himself back in good enough health to be a high-quality NFL player without the aid of all the advances in modern training, sports science, and all that jazz. It actually took Bleier until 1974 before he really got a shot in the Steelers backfield alongside Franco Harris. The rest, as they say, is history.

Here’s a sampling of Esten’s song, “The Names That You Don’t Know (The Ballad of Rocky Bleier)” that he co-wrote with the man himself.

This is merely one of many reasons why the NFL’s celebration of military veterans rocks. Awareness is raised about extraordinary stories like Rocky Bleier. When I think of those Steelers Super Bowl teams from the 1970s, I think of Harris’ Immaculate Reception, quarterback Terry Bradshaw, and that Steel Curtain defense.

I’ll admit I was totally unaware of Bleier’s legacy until Sunday’s halftime tribute. Has to be one of the most remarkable human interest narratives about perseverance that I’ve ever come across. Just awesome.

We’ll end here with some more Salute to Service sights and scenes from Pittsburgh’s Acrisure Stadium, along with a deeper-dive video on Bleier’s life.

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