The Pittsburgh Steelers are facing many questions right now with three games left to play and playoff hopes fading. But the biggest question might not come until the offseason. Sitting here today, I don’t think head coach Mike Tomlin or WR George Pickens are going anywhere. But one person they need to replace is Matt Canada. They need to find a new offensive coordinator. And they have to get it right.
For starters, they need to make sure that they bring in somebody who can give them the answer as to whether Kenny Pickett is their quarterback of the future. That’s job one. Determine if he can grow into a guy who can win you a Super Bowl. But more generally, they need somebody who will get players’ attention, Brooke Pryor says.
“The way for the Steelers to move forward and have success with Mike Tomlin as the head coach”, the ESPN reporter said on the Bill Barnwell Show, “is to go out and hire a proven offensive coordinator who comes in and commands that respect from Day One, and also maybe that Tomlin is just hands off. Like, ‘Man, this is all you, you are the head coach of the offense’”.
The closest he has ever come in his 17 years in Pittsburgh to hiring an offensive coordinator with a resume was Todd Haley. And many believe that that hiring was forced upon him from the ownership. Since then, he’s promoted Randy Fichtner, and then replaced him with Canada, another internal promotion.
While neither of those hires worked out, there have been some obvious talent issues as well. The erosion of the offensive line over the past half-decade or so has been a major component of all this. The Steelers used to have multiple perennial Pro Bowlers in the midst. They are hoping rookie first-round pick Broderick Jones can be the start of a new standard, but he’s searching for consistency.
“I would love to see someone that has Tomlin’s same personality, just with offensive traits, running the offense”, Pryor said, who brought up wanting to see Eric Bieniemy in Pittsburgh. “For everything from the talent evaluation to coaching to instilling leadership, all of these things”.
After Canada’s firing, Alex Kozora offered some names for potential successors to the offensive coordinator job using commonalities with the team. Some names included Byron Leftwich, Pep Hamilton, Jay Gruden, Tee Martin, and Alex Van Pelt, as well as Pickett’s college quarterbacks coach, Mark Whipple. He was also Roethlisberger’s first quarterbacks coach in Pittsburgh.
This is a decision on which they cannot err. That’s why many wonder how much autonomy Tomlin will even have to make the decision. Ray Fittipaldo of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, for example, said that the Steelers are not going to let him make the decision on his own. He might get an approved list to choose from. But that’s all a long way off and is impossible to know. There’s a reason behind the thought process, however. And it just stresses how high the stakes are.
