I remember my first time seeing the Pittsburgh Steelers on the football field. I can’t remember how old I was or the exact year, but I remember for weeks looking at the tickets on my father’s stand next to his chair where Steelers would be coming to Frostburg State University for a workout with the Washington Redskins. This was back when Washington would hold their training camp out in Western Maryland and it was only a couple hours drive for the Steelers to join them for a practice session.

I’m not sure how much the tickets cost. They might have been $5 or $10. I wasn’t concerned about those things back then. I just remember the anticipation of seeing the Steelers in person and how packed the visiting stands were with Steelers fans while only a handful of spectators were on the home side. I can’t remember a specific play or anything that happened other than the Steelers being in white jerseys on offense and it was a beautiful day.

With this in mind, even though I am now a Steelers season ticket holder and have the opportunity to see the Steelers in any home game I want, I see the value in bringing the fan experience to a joint practice.

On Thursday, the Steelers hosted the Buffalo Bills for a practice at Acrisure Stadium which was closed to the public which only had reporters and several invited guests. I asked myself if the Steelers missed out on a golden opportunity to bring a different fan experience to their home stadium.

It’s not that the Steelers haven’t used Acrisure Stadium/Heinz Firld to do events during the preseason, even charging fans a small fee for tickets. Although it was closed in 2020 due to Covid, the Steelers held training camp in 2021 in Pittsburgh and tickets were available for those to attend at the stadium. In 2017, I took my family to their Family Fest at the stadium where they just held a regular practice. During that time the Steelers even had specific sections blocked off where they invited youth football teams from the area to attend. Because of these various activities in the past, I’m surprised the Steelers didn’t have their practice open to the public, even if it was for a small price.

Perhaps because the Steelers are hosting the Bills for a preseason game on Saturday and there are still plenty of avenues to get tickets to the game, the Steelers thought fans may have chosen the practice setting over having more of the stadium filled for Saturday night’s contest. While I understand that thinking, I also see it as an opportunity for fans to come in and “double dip” in town for three days by catching the practice on Thursday and the game on Saturday. The triple or quadruple dip could have been even better as the Pirates are at home hosting the Mariners on Friday night. and at 1 PM on Saturday.

Since the Steelers have not held a joint practice in many years, perhaps they felt it was better to get one under their belt and make sure things ran smoothly without having more of an audience. Maybe the next time the Steelers host practice will be open to the public. But if the Steelers decide in the future to hold a joint practice at another team’s facility, I would fully expect them to monetize the situation as much as possible having the greatest franchise in professional sports coming to their venue.