The current credit crisis, making it difficult to swing a loan for a $150,000 mortgage, might prove almost as vexing for anyone attempting to convince a lender to finance $537 million or so for a football team -- somebody, say, such as Steelers chairman Dan Rooney.

Yet experts contend there remains a long line of potential outside buyers for the Steelers, even after New York billionaire Stanley Druckenmiller formally announced he has exited the bidding.

And it's a line of suitors who would require no assistance from any financial institution.

"[Druckenmiller] would've paid cash. I don't think he would've had to worry about financing very much," said Pitt professor Jay Sukit, a former investment banker who a decade ago left that realm -- his onetime employers Salomon Brothers and Smith Barney went out of business -- to teach at the Katz Graduate School of Business. One of his former clients, Les Alexander, purchased the NBA Houston Rockets in 1993 for $85 million in cash. "Frankly, it seems to me most people who buy these sports franchises don't worry much about financing -- different from what the Pirates went through when Kevin McClatchy tried to buy them [in 1996]. Pro football franchises are so lucrative, they attract buyers."

The potential pool may be shrinking in today's economic environment, but bidders still exist, the experts say. Especially for a valuable commodity such as a National Football League franchise. Especially for one of its brand-name products such as the five-time Super Bowl champion Steelers, worth roughly $1 billion in one recent valuation by Forbes magazine.

Mr. Druckenmiller's offer involved an immediate cash payment. A source indicated that he had assessed the team's enterprise value -- which takes into account the value of the entire business and includes the purchase of stock, not assets -- at $840 million.

"For everyone who's out of the picture, there's somebody else standing on the sideline when it comes to the National Football League," said Bob Caporale of Game Plan LLC, a Boston-based group that unsuccessfully bid for the Chicago Cubs recently and regularly consults for pro-sports ventures such as the purchases of the Boston Celtics and Los Angeles Dodgers. The company possesses a subsidiary firm with $215 million in reserve for investment. "The NFL continues to have, in my opinion, the most stable and sensible economic model. Our experience is, there continues to be interest in the NFL. I think the only issue is the values have increased to such a level obviously there's a much smaller universe of people who can afford a team."

One expert, attorney Jeffrey S. Phillips of the Stout Risius Ross financial firm that in part deals in sports mergers and acquisitions, doesn't rule out Mr. Druckenmiller from the potential bidders. In other words, just because the other four Rooney brothers decided not to accept his offer now, that doesn't preclude them from rejoining forces and forging a deal in the end.

"You see people withdraw bids and suddenly they become re-interested," Mr. Phillips said. "I wouldn't say that means he's definitely walking away. You'll see how things work out."

Mr. Druckenmiller vowed to keep Dan and son Art Rooney II in control of the franchise, designating Dan as "principal owner," if he was able to buy the four other Rooney brothers' stake. However, such a white-knight arrangement conceivably could have changed after a while.

"The first time [the new co-owner doesn't] like the direction something's going, do you exercise the fact that, 'I own 64 percent of the team and I want this coach fired, or this player signed, or this draft pick selected?' " asked RSS' Phillips. "It would be a tough one to think that the person would sit by as a passive owner after you write a $550 million check."

Game Plan's Mr. Caporale said, "Certainly from the standpoint of historical performance, Dan clearly has done an admirable job. From a standpoint of logic and intelligence, it makes sense [to keep him and Art II in charge]. The issue unfortunately in this business is ego and not what makes sense." As Mr. Sukit put it, ego is the reason people buy into sports, particularly when it requires bringing $550 million-plus to the deal.

Dan and Art Rooney II announced late Friday afternoon that they -- as NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell stated in their August sitdown in New York -- aim to keep the franchise all in the family, where it started with Art "Chief" Rooney in 1933.

"I know the NFL definitely wants ownership that's individual, that really wants to be part of building the team. They don't want corporations. And they have the 30-percent limit," said Brian Marler of the sports-investment branch of Houlihan Lokey, an international investment bank. "And I would imagine the NFL wants a local presence before anyone else."

However, experts noted those NFL rules -- a primary owner must hold a minimum 30-percent stake -- and debt limits -- $150 million against the team as collateral -- could gum up such plans.

"They'll probably find a suitor somewhere who'll buy it for cash," said Pitt's Mr. Sukit. "The thing I find problematical in this market is, if Dan Rooney tries to buy out his brothers, where will he find the funding? Right now, you don't see a lot of lending going on. You see all these investment banks in unbelievable turmoil."

The details of Dan Rooney's offer to his brothers have not been disclosed. The NFL did not know the identity of any potential investors when Dan Rooney and his brothers met with Mr. Goodell in New York in late August and, according to a source, was asked by the NFL to reveal them.

As for any other investors, maybe government intervention in the lending industry and Mr. Druckenmiller's announced departure will "shake loose somebody who was on the fence," said John Milne, CEO of JKMilne Asset Management in Station Square.

"They're a great family, they're a great franchise, it's an important franchise for the NFL," said Mr. Caporale of Game Plan. "It will get worked out, in my opinion."