The Pittsburgh Steelers have signed left tackle Max Starks to a 4-year deal worth $26.3 million on Tuesday.

“We were very fortunate to have him,” Steelers director of football operations Kevin Colbert said. “A transition on a backup probably didn’t make a lot of sense, but we didn’t feel like we would have been as good a team without him. We wanted to do a long-term deal [in 2008] but we couldn’t get it done.”

The deal also gives Starks $10 million in guaranteed money.

Starks is one of the best left tackles in the game and the Steelers should be happy to finally have him locked up for the next few years.