Steelers Now
PITTSBURGH — There’s been quite a bit of roster turnover for the Pittsburgh Steelers from the 2024 season to the 2025 season, but that isn’t the only change at UPMC Rooney Sports Complex.
As the Steelers returned to their usual practice home after three weeks away at St. Vincent College on Monday, they were greeted by a new-look locker room.
Over the offseason, the Steelers’ locker room got new signage, lighting, paint, carpets, and many of the metal, temporary lockers that players have been using over the last few years were replaced with permanent, wooden lockers to match the rest of the room.
The changes were a hit with the players.
“I love the new paint job,” tackle Broderick Jones said of the bold, black walls. “I think I’m gonna go black around the house.”
#Steelers OL Broderick Jones is a fan of the new-look locker room, which got new lighting, paint, carpets and some new lockers this offseason. pic.twitter.com/bB96R5kfeZ
— Alan Saunders (@ASaunders_PGH) August 18, 2025
The facility, which opened in 2000, has largely looked the same throughout its lifetime, with just small updates over the last 25 years.
The changes didn’t make the facility — which was designed with NFL rosters were smaller, with fewer practice squad and injured reserve slots — any bigger. But it did maximize the space available, moving things around to try to get more players into permanent lockers and adding some more-modern touches to the still-traditional facility.
The Steelers’ facilities have come under increased scrutiny since the NFLPA began issuing an annual facilities report card, based on player surveys, in 2023. The Steelers’ facilities have consistently gotten low marks overall, but the locker room has specifically been a point of contention.
Steelers players in the NFLPA survey gave the team’s locker room a D grade in this year’s survey — the sixth-worst in the league. One of the teams below them, the Washington Commanders, have already unveiled a completely new locker room for the 2025 season.
A team source told Steelers Now that the changes were largely made in reaction to the player complaints.
The Steelers are in still in the planning stages for major changes to the future of the facility, team sources told Steelers Now. Many of the issues the team currently has require more square footage to fully address, and the facility, shared with the University of Pittsburgh and atightly bound between railroad tracks and the Monongahela River on the South Side, is difficult to expand. The future plans could involve expansion of the existing facilities or some kind of relocation. The Steelers’ lease with UPMC runs through 2030.
This article originally appeared on Steelers Now: Steelers South Side Locker Room Gets Facelift
