The Pittsburgh Steelers brought Arthur Smith aboard as their new offensive coordinator this offseason after too many years of a substandard offense under Matt Canada. Smith joins Pittsburgh after a stint as the head coach of the Atlanta Falcons, and PFF’s Sam Monson thinks Smith can follow in the footsteps of another former Falcons head coach-turned-coordinator and find some success.
Dan Quinn was hired as the Washington Commanders head coach after a successful stint with the Dallas Cowboys as their defensive coordinator following his firing from Atlanta, and Monson thinks that Smith can have a “rejuvenation” in a coordinator role like Quinn did.
“A lot of times when these head coaches get a chance to step back into a coordinator role because things didn’t go that well, you get a massive rejuvenation of their scheme, their side of the ball. Think of Dan Quinn, a similar dynamic, right? Dan Quinn’s thing had run his course, he went back to Dallas, that defense was amazing. That was the best version of Dan Quinn. And now he got another opportunity off the bank of that. So don’t write off the idea that Dan Quinn’s system can still be an extremely good system for quarterbacks,” Monson said on the PFF NFL Show.
While Quinn had more success as a head coach than Smith, it’s an apt comparison given that both were extremely good coordinators before taking on a head coaching role. Quinn had a lot of success with Dallas leading its defense, and Smith is looking for similar results with Pittsburgh’s offense.
If Smith does turn around a Steelers offense that’s just been bad over the last few seasons, it wouldn’t be a surprise if he garnered head coaching interest again down the line, as Quinn did. It’s not going to be an easy task, but with a revamped offense line and either Russell Wilson or Justin Fields at quarterback, there’s improved personnel. Add Najee Harris and Jaylen Warren in the backfield for Smith’s run-heavy scheme, and the Steelers should be better.
But should is the operative word there, and we said the same thing about the offense last season. Then we got teased with a nearly perfect preseason before a terrible start to the season and an offense that was stuck in neutral until Mason Rudolph took over under center. Smith has a good pedigree as an OC though, and it would frankly be a surprise if he didn’t make this offense at least average. As with Quinn, a return to a coordinator role could benefit him as it’s a lower-stress environment than being the head coach and Smith will be able to home in on the offense and get creative running the show on just one side of the ball.
I’m excited to see how it works out and just how much better Smith can make this offense, which really needs an injection if Pittsburgh is going to make the playoffs and compete.
