Terry Bradshaw won four Super Bowls for Art Rooney, the man who founded the Pittsburgh Steelers in 1933, yet he was not at Rooney’s funeral in 1988. Bradshaw has now addressed that absence, calling it a mistake on his part and explaining what kept him away.

“I just didn’t go to Mr. Rooney’s funeral because I didn’t want to be around Chuck Noll, but that just was wrong of me.” Terry Bradshaw said on The Rich Roll Podcast. “Just so immature. But that’s, you know, that’s me. Not proud of it. There are a lot of things I’ve done I’m not proud of, but you’re spot on. I’m just unfortunately at 78; I still get my feelings hurt. I still long for people to love me.”

Art Rooney died on August 25, 1988, at 87, from complications of a stroke. So when his funeral came, the absence of Terry Bradshaw stood out, and the reason traces back to his old coach, Chuck Noll.

To understand why, let’s look at how those two got along. Bradshaw needed encouragement, and Noll wasn’t built to give it. In 2025, Bradshaw still admits to holding a grudge, though he also credits Noll with making him better.

“I did not like my head coach at all, Chuck Noll,” said Bradshaw on the To The Point Home Services Podcast. “He was not a nice person. And he was mean to me. In all my 14 years of playing for him, he never shook my hand one time [say], ‘Nice job, Terry…I was walking out, going onto the field to play the Cleveland Browns. And he stopped me, and he said, ‘You mess up out there today, and I’ll bench your ass in the first half.”

It’s a little sad that Noll drained so much of the joy out of the game for him. Still, Bradshaw did what no quarterback had done before, winning four Super Bowls. It’s hard to picture Pittsburgh getting there without him, and you could fairly wonder if they’d have won any.

That tension explains the absence at the funeral. Speaking on The Fan Morning Show in 2021, Bradshaw said the only one he regrets missing is the one for the club’s founder.

“The Mr. Rooney funeral was something; I really screwed that up,” said Bradshaw.

He feels differently about Dan Rooney and Noll. Bradshaw says he doesn’t attend funerals unless family is involved. The one Steelers funeral he did attend was for Joe Greene’s wife, Agnes, who died in 2015 after a battle with cancer. On Noll, he was blunt.

“I wasn’t ever going to Chuck Noll’s funeral,” said Bradshaw.

He knows Steelers fans love him now and says the feeling is mutual, though his bond with the team and the city was strained for years after he left. He puts the blame where it belongs.

“I feel appreciated now; it wasn’t really the fans,” said Bradshaw. “I had a problem with Chuck Noll. I didn’t have a problem with the fans.”

Still, there was one person in the organization he never had trouble with. That was “The Chief.”

“If Mr. Rooney could say he loved a player, he’d say he loved me,” said Bradshaw. “We were really buddies. I had a key to his office, I had a key to his cigar room, I used to go over his house, and we’d watch Monday Night Football together . . . he used to always give me encouragement and just a good man. That one I regret, but that’s the only one.”

In the end, the missed funeral says less about loyalty than about a feud that never fully healed. Bradshaw still wishes he’d gone, for the one man who gave him the encouragement he craved.