Cam Newton wears cleats honoring victims of Pittsburgh shooting

PITTSBURGH -- Carolina Panthers quarterback Cam Newton showed his support for the grieving city of Pittsburgh and his team's owner by wearing black and gold warm-up cleats with "Hatred Can't Weaken A City of Steel'' on the side before Thursday night's game against the Steelers.

Steelers quarterback Ben Roethlisberger showed his support as well with cleats that said "Stronger Than Hate'' and listed the names of the 11 people recently shot and killed by a gunman at Tree of Life synagogue.

Pittsburgh is the hometown of Carolina owner David Tepper, who was a minority owner of the Steelers before he purchased the Panthers earlier this year for $2.275 billion, a record for an NFL team.

While the site of the shooting wasn't Tepper's primary synagogue, he lived in the neighborhood near it while in graduate school at Carnegie Mellon University.

One of Tepper's best friends was married in that synagogue.

Tepper wasn't surprised Newton and Roethlisberger wore cleats to raise awareness for the tragedy.

"It's great to see that,'' he said. "As I've said a lot of times, people don't appreciate how great the guys are doing things in the community. It's great to see. It's not surprising to see. There's so much people get used to, but it's really a good thing these guys do.''