Though the Pittsburgh Steelers season has been over for nearly a month, the team is making its share of coaching staff changes right now. To date, the biggest one is the team parting ways with WRs Coach Frisman Jackson after two years with the Steelers. The organization will begin searching for his replacement with a hire likely made prior to this year’s Combine at the end of the month.
Predicting who that next man will be is tough. But here are six sensible candidates.
Hines Ward – Former Steelers Wide Receiver
As our Ross McCorkle wrote about Monday, Ward will be the most-discussed option to replace Jackson. He’s looking for a job after ending his stint as the San Antonio Brahmas head coach. Ward’s qualifications are obvious. A legendary Steelers receiver with toughness and an old-school mentality. His blocking mentality fits in with how the Steelers are built and what new Steelers OC Arthur Smith needs from his receivers: selfless players and high-effort blockers.
Ward served as an intern with Pittsburgh in 2017, spending plenty of time with a then-rookie JuJu Smith-Schuster. He reportedly was strongly in the mix to become the Steelers’ receivers coach ahead of the 2018 season before the team tabbed Darryl Drake instead. Ward can hopefully mentor and calm a wide receiver room that felt uneasy and chaotic this year and might be the right man for the right time.
Bobby Engram – Washington Commanders
My guess is the Steelers will prefer an older and more veteran coach this time around for this group. Engram, 51, has been coaching since 2011 after a solid NFL career with the Chicago Bears and Seattle Seahawks. There are local ties with Engram coaching at the University of Pittsburgh as their WRs coach in 2012 and 2013, developing Tyler Boyd his freshman season.
He graduated to the NFL and spent five years as the Baltimore Ravens’ wide receivers coach from 2014 to 2018 before serving as their tight ends coach for the next three years, developing TE Mark Andrews. Engram dipped back to the coaching ranks at Wisconsin for 2022 as their coordinator and quarterbacks coach before taking a job with the Commanders in 2023, working with Terry McLaurin and Jahan Dotson.
With a new coaching staff in Washington, Engram’s role with the team is unclear, and the organization might bring someone else in under new OC Kliff Kingsbury.
Sanjay Lal – Seattle Seahawks
Lal has always been in high regard in coaching circles for his football IQ and ability to teach. He’s bounced around from team to team, including two stints with Seattle, but is best known for his two years with the Dallas Cowboys, 2018 and 2019. In ’19, he allowed 25-year-old wideout Amari Cooper to have a career year after being acquired from the Oakland Raiders.
Since, he’s spent time in Seattle working with D.K. Metcalf and Jaxon Smith-Njigba, young and talented receivers like what the Steelers are currently working with. Like Engram, Lal is caught in a new coaching staff and it’s not certain if he’ll stay under new head coach Mike Macdonald. This would be a huge get for Tomlin.
Edgar Bennett – Las Vegas Raiders
A former NFL running back in the 90s, Bennett’s been coaching wide receivers since 2011. He also has an NFL coordinator background, the Packers’ OC from 2015 to 2017. Since then, he’s served as the Raiders’ wide receivers coach, but it’s not clear if he’ll remain on staff as Antonio Pierce puts together his group. Given his relationship with new OC Luke Getsy (the two worked together in Green Bay), there’s a decent chance he stays, but that’s not cemented. Especially if you could offer him an Assistant Head Coach Title (and raise that comes with it), a spot that’s been vacant since John Mitchell retired last February.
Given his experience, he could be a good presence for the Steelers’ coaching staff.
Brennan Marion – UNLV
Throwing a college name into the mix, Marion is a sneaky good fit. Though he doesn’t fit the bill as the older coach, just 36 years old, he’s a bright offensive mind with ties to Pittsburgh. He served as the Panthers’ wide receivers coach in 2021 before taking a job at Texas to be their Pass Game Coordinator and QBs Coach, working with Quinn Ewers his freshman year as the Longhorns began to turn their program around.
With that success, UNLV hired him as their offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach in 2023. He helped turn around a lifeless program, finishing 9-5. It was the school’s first winning season since 2013 and the most victories since 1984 (though the school forfeited all their wins that year for playing with ineligible players). Marion’s offense averaged 34.4 points per game, 22nd in the country.
He’s known for his “Go-Go” fast-paced offense and is regarded as a budding star in the college ranks. Moving to receivers coach would be a downgrade in title, but it’d also be his first shot in the NFL. A Hampton, Virginia native who spent time coaching at William & Mary, there are easy Mike Tomlin ties here.
Dallas Baker – Baylor
Dallas Baker, The Touchdown Maker. That’s still how I remember him. A former 7th-round pick of the Steelers who caught exactly one career pass – which we, of course, wrote about – before moving on with life’s work. He got into coaching in 2015, spending two years at a small Christian college before being hired by Marshall in 2017. After spending a year at Buffalo, Baker was named Baylor’s wide receivers coach in 2022.
He feels less likely to be the hire with a resume similar to Jackson’s minus the NFL experience but he’s an interesting name worth passing along.
