Coaching moves from within make little sense

After weeks of speculation and potential turnover, the Steelers’ offensive coaching staff is… After weeks of speculation and potential turnover, the Steelers’ offensive coaching staff is finally starting to shape up for 2004.

After former Pittsburgh offensive coordinator Mike Mularkey skipped town last week to assume the head coaching responsibilities for the Buffalo Bills, and current Steelers offensive line coach Russ Grimm was turned down by the Chicago Bears after being named a finalist for their vacant head coaching position, Bill Cowher had some important decisions to make.

Rather than conduct a drawn-out job search for a new offensive coordinator, Cowher took a page from his own book on Tuesday, promoting tight ends coach Ken Whisenhunt to offensive coordinator. This, of course, is how the Steelers came up with their last offensive coordinator, when then-tight ends coach Mularkey was promoted to offensive coordinator after Kevin Gilbride was fired in 2000.

But Cowher didn’t stop there. Perhaps frightened by the Bears’ interest in Grimm, Cowher promoted him to assistant head coach in addition to his offensive line coaching duties.

This all sounds fine and good, but the only problem for the Steelers in all of this coaching roulette is that two of their biggest weaknesses in 2003’s 6-10 campaign were their tight ends and their offensive line.

I don’t want to beat a dead horse, and I know that the Steelers were banged-up up front all season, but Pittsburgh’s offensive line was bad in 2003. I mean, really, really bad.

Tommy Maddox was sacked 41 times in 2003. Among AFC quarterbacks, only Drew Bledsoe ended up on his butt in the backfield more times this season. The O-line took 15 weeks to open up any holes for either Amos Zeroue or Jerome Bettis, and as a result, the Steelers bested only the Detroit Lions in rushing yardage.

The tight ends should have been a different story. Jay Riemersma was the biggest off-season free agent pickup for the Steelers last year, but he spent the majority of the season injured. For a pass-happy offense, the tight end combination of Riemersma, Jerame Tuman and Mark Bruener caught a total of only 24 passes for 263 yards and two touchdowns, hardly gaudy statistics. And Bruener, one of the best blocking tight ends in the NFL throughout his career, was deemed inactive for the first two games of the season.

The Steelers are an organization that likes to keep it in the family. They always have been, and for the most part, this mentality has brought them success. But does this type of on-field productivity really merit a promotion for either Whisenhunt or Grimm? Or even Mularkey, whose offense finished 22nd in the NFL in 2003?

There are plenty of capable head coaches and assistants in both the professional and college ranks who could have injected life into the Steelers offense next year and would have killed for a job with a big-name professional organization. Unlike in college football, the Steelers don’t have to worry about recruiting, so they could have taken their time looking for a new coordinator and interviewing potential candidates.

Instead, the Steelers put the offense in the hands of Whisenhunt, who won’t make any dramatic changes to Mularkey’s old system. And based on last year’s performance, Mularkey’s system obviously does not work anymore with Pittsburgh’s current personnel.

It’s time to give some new coaches a chance in the Steel City, and just to illustrate how incestuous and stupid the Pittsburgh-Buffalo coaching carousel has been over the last five years, consider this: Gilbride was Mularkey’s boss as the offensive coordinator in Pittsburgh from 1999 to 2000. Gilbride become the offensive coordinator in Buffalo and Mularkey got his job. Now, Mularkey has been named the head coach in Buffalo, and if Gilbride doesn’t accept a head coaching position somewhere else in the league, Mularkey will be his boss in Buffalo next season.

Now that’s what I call some backwards job mobility.

Michael Cunningham is a senior staff writer for The Pitt News. He thinks that the Steelers should hire Matt Miloszewski as their new quarterbacks coach.