When Pittsburgh Steelers quarterback Ben Roethlisberger does something stupid in the off-season, which the latest news suggests is becoming a habit, that knife plunges straight into the heart of the region. Before Friday, the fans had already felt the tip of that blade too many times before.

In June 2006, the quarterback almost killed himself on Second Avenue near the 10th Street Bridge in a motorcycle accident while riding without a helmet.

Last year, a 31-year-old resort hostess employed by Harrah's Lake Tahoe alleged in a civil suit that Ben Roethlisberger had raped her in his hotel room while he was attending a charity golf event in July 2008. The woman never went to police and her claim, still in the courts, may turn out to be frivolous. At the very least, though, it seems Ben Roethlisberger got himself into a situation that someone in his position should have known to avoid.

That lesson apparently was not learned. Now, less than a year after the Nevada trouble became public, a woman has come forward to say she was sexually assaulted by the Steelers' quarterback -- only this time the accuser, a 20-year-old college student, went to the police.

For the moment, he has not been arrested or charged but the police in Milledgeville, Ga., not far from the quarterback's summer vacation home, have undertaken an investigation -- and he has responded by hiring a high-powered team of Atlanta criminal defense attorneys.

Because mistaken identification seems unlikely in this case -- whatever else he is, Big Ben is not easily confused with someone else -- only two possible scenarios seem to present themselves. The quarterback did something bad or the woman made a false charge for whatever reason.

But even with the presumption of innocence, it is hard to be tolerant of the apparent fact that he put himself into another position where trouble was a potential member of his party. What is a 28-year-old superstar doing cruising the bars in a college town late at night? With no thought for himself or his fans, this sack is on him.

Cartoonist Rob Rogers does "Rob's Rough," an early look at his work and his creative process, exclusively at PG+, a members-only web site of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. Our introduction to PG+ gives you all the details.