Less than a calendar year after saying goodbye to the Steelers and their fans to finish his career where it started in Washington D.C., Ryan Clark today announced his retirement from the National Football League.

A fan favorite whose loquacious nature will serve him well as an NFL analyst, it is no stretch to say that Troy Polamalu would not have had nearly as many spectacular plays over his career had he not had a partner like Clark at free safety in the Steelers' defensive backfield. Their on field chemistry was so great it was as if the two shared a brain at times...........

read more @ http://burgh.us/rw1

Quick side note: lest Clark merely be remembered for being a head-splitting barbarian, it is more worth remembering that he was one of the all-time great guys with fans and especially kids up at training camp, a total ham that signed every autograph after practice and gave away his equipment almost daily.
I'm really going to miss Ryan and our other vets at training camp. I still look for Hines smile, he'd always stand near the fence at the bottom of the hill with the shade trees where we like to sit and talk to the fans. And then there was Ryan's crazy socks. Goodbye to the old, hello to the new era Steelers. They have some big holes to fill in our hearts, for sure.

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Be sure to click on the link inside the story for Ryan's "exit intervierw". He may have been out spoken at times, but it was Ryan's influence that persuaded the Steelrs to vote "no" for the CBO contract, which we now know as pure genius. He knew.