When news broke Tuesday morning that Pittsburgh Steelers offensive coordinator Matt Canada had been fired, the thought was that head coach Mike Tomlin was the one who made that judgement call. He was the name on the Steelers statement saying they were relieving Canada of his duties, making it look like he was the one to pull the trigger.
Former Steelers Director of Football Operations and former GM of the Buffalo Bills Doug Whaley appeared on The Fan Morning Show and was asked by Dorin Dickerson how he thought the firing went down.
“If it was Mike Tomlin’s decision, it would’ve been done Monday morning,” Whaley said on The Fan Morning Show. “He would’ve called him in Monday morning before anyone got there and said, ‘I’m letting you go,’ so he can get his stuff out of there or come back late that night to clean out his office, and then when he met with the team on Monday, he would’ve said, ‘We’re making this change.’ So people wouldn’t be hearing it from media or social media.
“I think what happened… came in Monday. They did it. Art [Rooney II] said Monday night ‘Let’s meet, Coach Tomlin. We have to make a move.’ That’s, to me, [is] the most standard operating procedure and the most professional way to do it. Don’t let that guy come in blindsided when everyone else is around. You call him in ‘Hey, get here at 4:30 in the morning,’ so he can have some dignity, clean out his office, and not have to be walking in like, ‘Alright, let’s go. Let’s get ready for Cincy.'”
When the news broke early Tuesday morning that Canada had been canned, it came as a bit of a shock to many, as you would come to expect any move to be made as soon as possible after the game in order to allow the team to best transition with Canada no longer there in the building. Ultimately, it doesn’t appear that was the case. News didn’t break until Tuesday morning until after the players had come and gone from the facility on Monday, finding out via social media (and reportedly a team group text) that their offensive coordinator had been fired as Tomlin mentioned in his weekly press conference.
In theory, it would make sense for Tomlin to wait to fire Canada when the players weren’t around to give him a sense of dignity and to avoid any awkwardness in the team facility on Monday as he cleaned out his office. Still, Tomlin could’ve easily called Canada in on Monday morning to get the job done so he could address his team in a more professional manner. That ended up not being the case as everything culminated with the players out of the building on Tuesday.
It was reported by the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette’s Gerry Dulac that Rooney was the one to make the decision to fire Canada whereas Tomlin said in his presser that the decision was his and his alone. Every NFL front office is different, and each coach/owner has their own way of handling things, but Whaley has worked with Tomlin and knows Rooney and would have just as good a guess as anyone as to what actually happened.
We’ve long lamented that Tomlin had too much loyalty to Canada, even when it was clear that he wasn’t the answer as Pittsburgh’s offensive coordinator and that he was holding back the team. Given the timing of Canada’s dismissal, perhaps Rooney was the one who intervened and forced Tomlin’s hand, stating on Monday that he had to make the move with Pittsburgh 6-4 and in position to make the playoffs if the offense shows some signs of life down the stretch.
We’ll never truly know how the firing of Canada went down or if it truly was Tomlin’s sole decision or if Rooney was the one who pushed Tomlin to do it, but the timing of everything does support the point that Whaley is trying to make. Either way, Canada is no longer in the building, and the Steelers must have their offense prepared to play the Bengals on Sunday with a new play caller in Sullivan looking to get his young quarterback back on track.
