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Dunlap: Bettis Owes Huge Thanks To Big Ben, Tuman

One play didn't make Jerome Bettis' career.

But could one play --- to some degree --- have broken it?

Just a thought I've been having, a consideration that keeps jolting through my brain and we get set to celebrate one of the finest men to ever tuck a football underneath his arm and send him off to Canton to be enshrined into the Pro Football Hall of Fame.

Think about if Jan. 15, 2006 would have gone differently.

Think about if Nick Harper hadn't have been caught by Ben Roethlisberger (with an assist from Jerame Tuman) in that AFC Divisional Round Playoff game.

Think about if the Steelers don't get that win but, instead, lost that game and eventually there would have been no "Super Bowl Champion" on Bettis' resume.

Think about all of that and then think about this (because it's great tavern talk or sports talk fodder): If the Steelers lose that game to the Colts on Bettis' fumble, would he still be getting into the Hall of Fame?

To me, it's a fair debate.

There is no question the six-time Pro Bowler and two-time All-Pro who amassed 13,662 yards (sixth all-time) was a wonderful back on the power of those numbers, and on the power of being one of the finest big backs to ever hammer a football between the tackles.

But, it seems at least, the one big knock against him was that 3.9 yards per carry average, which kept him out of the Hall of Fame until his fifth try. Offsetting that yards per carry average was, and always will be, that demarcation and denotation that Bettis won a Super Bowl, that he got that ring in that much-publicized story of him winning in his final game in his hometown of Detroit.

But back to Harper for a second --- who was stabbed by his wife on the eve of the Steelers-Colts game in question --- what if he hadn't have been tracked down?

And back to the fundamental question: If the Steelers lose that game, especially the way it would have gone down with Bettis fumbling it away, would we be where we are this weekend, celebrating a brilliant football career with The Bus getting into The Hall?

I hope the answer would be that he would still be getting enshrined, but I can entertain the notion that the Super Bowl ring is what, definitively, made Jerome a Hall of Famer.

Anyhow, it's all such an amazing debate to have, how one play could have, in essence, saved a man's Hall of Fame credentials.

There's a secondary debate to that play --- and one much smaller a matter than if Bettis would have still found his way to Canton had Harper returned it to the house. Had Big Ben not felled Harper, would tight end Jerame Tuman have made the tackle? Tuman was tracking Harper no fewer than 30 yards and pounced on Harper just after Roethlisberger swept the defensive back-turned-return man's balance.

Back in 2006, Tuman told the Post-Gazette's fabulous columnist Gene Collier as training camp commenced the season after that glorious Super Bowl run: "I didn't find out until after the game that Ben had slowed him up. I was tracking him, and there was a point where he made a step back to the inside. I felt like I had him at that point."

Watching the play what seems like 1,000 times now, it was a good thing Roethlisberger and Tuman busted their backsides and played through the whistle to bring down Harper.

Bettis should forever be indebted to them.

They not only saved a football game and a Super Bowl run, they just might have saved the chances at Jerome Bettis getting into the Hall of Fame.

At the very least, that's up for debate, right?

Colin Dunlap is a featured columnist at CBSPittsburgh.com. He can also be heard weekdays from 5:40 a.m. to 10 a.m. on Sports Radio 93-7 "The Fan." You can e-mail him at colin.dunlap@cbsradio.com. Check out his bio here.

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