Steelers Bully Jack Lambert Once Gave Teammate's Mom An Exclusive Invite To Hang Out In The Legendary Sauna

The Pittsburgh Steelers of the 1970s were a different breed of players than the ones we encounter today. The sport has changed, regardless of whether you see it as positive or negative. It was tougher, grittier and the players were too. After games and practices today, players might soak in ice baths and get cupping treatments, massages, or acupuncture. But in the 1970s, the Steelers players hit the sauna at Three Rivers Stadium. This wasn't exactly for therapeutic reasons, as they smoked cigarettes around a trashcan full of beer. They would re-live the game and tell stories from the past, all while relentlessly teasing each other. 

Being on the roster wasn't enough to give you open access to the sauna where all the big names could be found. Jack Lambert and Mike Webster always seemed to be holding court and acting as de facto bouncers. Others, such as Terry Bradshaw, Rocky Bleier, Franco Harris, and Joe Greene, could often be found there, along with many others who floated in and out. Occasionally, stories have popped up about when they invited an opponent to join them. This happened to Cincinnati Bengals quarterback Ken Anderson, who earned the begrudging respect of Greene and was invited into this inner sanctum, nearly costing him his flight home. 

According to Gary M. Pomerantz, in his book Their Life's Work, Lambert once bestowed an invitation to a non-combatant -- teammate Gary Dunn's mother. Dunn, a longtime member of the Steelers defensive line, helped the team win two Super Bowls. Dunn frequently hung out with the other guys in the sauna, and according to Pomerantz, one night, long after almost everyone had left, he discovered his mother was waiting for him after a game. 

"She'd had a long wait, and Dunn told her that he planned to sit with his teammates in the sauna a while longer. 'Well, then can I come in there and have a beer with you,' his mother asked. Dunn thought it was a bad idea ('The sauna is not a place for your mother,' he would say), but he reconsidered, and told her that he would find out. 'Jack, Brad, do you guys care if my mom comes in and has a beer with us,' he asked. Lambert and Bradshaw thought the idea of Gary Dunn's mother joining them in the sauna [was] hysterical and preposterous, and so naturally, they consented, saying, 'Bring her in, buddy!'"

Pomerantz said that Bradshaw and Lambert teased Dunn mercilessly. They always did this to everyone, but with his mom there, they dialed it up. They asked his mom how on earth she gave birth to that! After all, Dunn was 6'4" and 258 pounds. They joked with her that he must have had some problems in his childhood. 

But they showed her a great deal of kindness—kindness that Dunn told Pomerantz she never forgot. After a few beers, she asked her son for a field tour. He relented and took her out into the darkness of the stadium to show her around. 

"As the beers took effect, she pretended in the darkness to be a drum majorette marching alone down the field at Three Rivers Stadium and tossing an imaginary baton high in the air. Grounds crew members turned from their work to watch. Dunn asked the grounds crew chief [Steven] Dirt DeNardo, 'Can you turn on some lights? Mom can't see her baton,' and so DeNardo flipped on the field lights. As his mother marched from the 40-yard line to midfield, her legs kicking high, Gary Dunn decided, This is awesome!"

Dunn spent 12 seasons with the Steelers from the late '70s to the mid-'80s. A steal in the sixth round in 1976 out of Miami, he was a team captain for four years. He had 35 career sacks, including ones on Joe Namath, Bob Griese, and Jim Kelly.  

The Steelers Sauna Was A Special Place

Pomerantz tells other stories about that sauna at Three Rivers, but what is conveyed in them is how it helped foster this team's brotherhood. That bond, that brotherhood, is the central focus of all of the stories in his book. Bradshaw told him it was an "escape," a place where no one could get to them. Bradshaw said it was where the team had the most fun. 

While times have changed, the NFL is a more transient place than it once was. It used to be the norm for players to spend their whole careers with a team, but now it is the exception. The one thing that hasn't changed is the brotherhood. It doesn't have to be in the sauna around a trashcan of beer; it can be in the offensive line meetings that happened at Maurkice Pouncey's house for years or how the veteran Steelers welcome new guys into the fold.  

Football makes fans feel like they are a part of something bigger. It is like Lambert holds the sauna door open for you and says, "Come on in," and just like that, you are a member of the brotherhood. 

If you could have drank a beer with any 1970s Steeler in the sauna, who would it have been and why? Click to comment below!

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