The Steelers rarely hire head coaches. In the moves made since Richard Nixon was in the White House, the Steelers consistently have gotten ahead of the curve, spotting a future Hall of Famer before he became a household name.
Most expected that again. A first-time head coach not yet known to the fan base but, thanks to the Rooney imprimatur, destined for greatness.
Instead, Steeler Nation got a Pittsburgh native with 18 years of NFL head-coaching experience, and more firings than Super Bowl appearances. And while it’s possible that Mike McCarthy, who has an 11-11 record in the postseason, will deliver the franchise’s first playoff win since 2016, they’re far more interested in their first Super Bowl win since 2008.
Some of the dismay comes from the decision to pounce on McCarthy before conducting in-person interviews with Rams pass game coordinator Nate Scheelhaase or Rams defensive coordinator Chris Shula. Some of it comes from the fact that no one else was seemingly hot on McCarthy’s trail in the current coaching carousel, with McCarthy interviewed by only two teams — the Titans and Giants.
None of the other teams looking for new head coaches (Ravens, Browns, Cardinals, Raiders, Bills, Falcons, Dolphins) were linked to McCarthy. And if any of those teams reached out to McCarthy and he passed because he was waiting for a better opportunity with a more stable organization, there were no reports to that effect.
Go back to January 2025. When McCarthy left the Cowboys, the Jets, Patriots, Jaguars, Raiders, Bears, and Saints were conducting coaching searches. Only the Bears interviewed him.
The NFL, with only 32 teams, is a fairly small, tight-knit operation. Word gets around about the best coaching candidates. The league-wide buzz around McCarthy doesn’t mesh with his objective accomplishments. That’s a red flag for the folks who wave yellow towels.
Much has been made about McCarthy’s track record in comparison to John Harbaugh’s. Both have been to one Super Bowl. Both have won one Super Bowl. Postseason included, McCarthy has coached 310 games, winning 60 percent of them. Harbaugh has coached 317 games. He has won 60.9 percent.
But when Harbaugh became available, an instant land rush emerged for his services. His agent heard from more teams than there were vacancies. The Giants landed the biggest fish in the current cycle, with Harbaugh utilizing rare leverage to squeeze the Giants into reshaping their football operation.
For McCarthy, the vibe has been much different. After he was fired by the Packers during the 2018 season, there was no clamor to hire him in 2019. In the 2025 and 2026 cycles, there was one and only one offer. From the Steelers.
Steelers fans hold their team in very high regard. They believe the Steelers should be the franchise to which candidates with options flock. Despite the similarities between McCarthy’s and Harbaugh’s résumés, Harbaugh’s arrival to the Giants carried the kind of buzz that the Steelers fans would have expected, if the franchise was going to break dramatically from its 57-year history of hiring a future star whose name was not yet widely known.
Really, if they were going the former-coach route, why didn’t the Steelers make a run at Harbaugh? When Mike Tomlin resigned, Harbaugh had not yet begun negotiating a contract with the Giants. Presented with Harbaugh and McCarthy as the two options, it would have been an 80-20 issue for folks in the 412 area code.
And while wins (especially in January) will get fans to warm up to the decision, short-term losses will spark more of the naked vitriol that emerged during the embarrassing November 30 home loss to the Bills.
Consider McCarthy’s first year in Dallas. A Week 9 loss to the Steelers dropped the Cowboys’ record to 2-7. If that’s how 2026 starts for the Steelers, they’ll be chanting “Fire McCarthy” at Penguins games — and Styx will kindly ask the Steelers to cease and desist playing Renegade.
The silver lining in the black and gold cloud that many Steelers fans see brewing is that McCarthy had three straight 12-5 seasons in Dallas. The Steelers have had only two seasons of 12 or more wins since 2011, and none since 2020.
The sooner the Steelers can get that kind of performance out of McCarthy, the sooner Steelers fans will move past the perception that they settled for a coach who, despite his Harbaugh-esque successes, had nowhere else to go.
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Vikings defensive coordinator Brian Flores, whose scheme helped Minnesota have the No. 3 defense in the league in 2025, apparently won’t be leaving.
Signed to a new contract, subject to a head-coaching opportunity, the recent filling of the Ravens and Steelers jobs means that — barring an unexpected development — Flores will be back with the Vikings in 2026.
Flores had been interviewed by both Baltimore and Pittsburgh. The Ravens hired Jesse Minter, and the Steelers (who loved Flores during his time there in 2022) will be hiring Mike McCarthy.
It’s still possible that Flores will emerge as a candidate for one of the remaining vacancies, with the Raiders, Bills, Cardinals, and Browns. But he has not yet been interviewed for any of those jobs.
Beyond his lawsuit against the NFL and four teams (Dolphins, Giants, Broncos, and Texans), which legally should not be a factor but let’s not be naive, there are questions about Flores’s time with the Dolphins and his time with the Vikings. Recently, former Minnesota assistant Mike Pettine said just enough to confirm the existence of a red flag.
And so it appears Flores will be back with the Vikings, for a fourth season. There’s no doubt that coach Kevin O’Connell thinks highly of Flores. Enough to overcome any friction that may have occurred within the coaching staff.
The scheme works. In 2025, it worked almost well enough to overcome a bottom-five offense to get to the postseason. If the Minnesota offense can improve just a little bit in 2026, the Vikings will continue their trend of making it to the playoffs, roughly every other year.
Arthur Smith is headed to the college level.
According to multiple reports, Smith is finalizing a deal to become Ohio State’s offensive coordinator.
Smith, 42, had received interest from the Cardinals and Titans for their dad coaching vacancies this month. He was also up for at least one offensive coordinator role in the league.
But Smith instead will head to the college level, where he’ll work under head coach Ryan Day. Smith joins another former NFL head coach on staff, as Matt Patricia is the program’s current defensive coordinator.
Smith had spent most of his career with Tennessee before becoming Atlanta’s head coach in 2021. The Falcons went 7-10 in each of Smith’s three seasons.
This is not Smith’s first college coaching job, as he began his career as a graduate assistant for North Carolina before heading to Ole Missin 2010 as a defensive intern/administrative assistant.
The Steelers have confirmed that Mike McCarthy is set to become their next head coach.
The team announced that they have reached a verbal agreement with McCarthy on Saturday afternoon. The announcement comes after multiple reports indicated that the Steelers had decided to make McCarthy their fourth head coach since 1969.
McCarthy has a 174–112–2 regular season record and an 11-11 postseason record over 18 years as the head coach of the Packers and Cowboys. That postseason record includes Green Bay’s Super Bowl XLV win over his new employers.
That kind of experience makes the 62-year-old McCarthy a major departure from his immediate predecessors in Pittsburgh. Chuck Noll, Bill Cowher, and Mike Tomlin had no head coaching experience when the Steelers hired them. All three of those coaches went on to win at least one Super Bowl during their time in the job and the Steelers will be hoping McCarthy can deliver the same kind of success.
The relationship between incoming Steelers coach Mike McCarthy and current (for now) Steelers quarterback Aaron Rodgers didn’t begin with McCarthy’s arrival as Green Bay’s head coach in 2006. It started a year earlier, when McCarthy was the 49ers’ offensive coordinator — and when the 49ers spurned Rodgers for Alex Smith with the first overall pick in the draft.
As explained in Ian O’Connor’s book, Out Of The Darkness: The Mystery Of Aaron Rodgers, McCarthy downplays his role in the selection of Smith. Former 49ers head coach Mike Nolan, however, made it clear to O’Connor that McCarthy preferred Smith to Rodgers.
Despite Rodgers’s legendary ability to hold a grudge, they generally worked well together in Green Bay. Until they didn’t. In 2019, Tyler Dunne (then of BleacherReport.com) took a very deep dive into the relationship between Rodgers and McCarthy, who was fired late in the 2018 season.
“Mike has a low football IQ, and that used to always bother Aaron,” an unnamed source told Dunne at the time. “He’d say Mike has one of the lowest IQs, if not the lowest IQ, of any coach he’s ever had.”
Could a second act work, for a year? Rodgers would have to want it. McCarthy would have to want it. The chances of both wanting it seem, given the full history, slim.
Still, the Steelers need to be smart with this one. Don’t bring Rodgers in and tell him it’s over; that’s where the Jets erred last year. Let Rodgers make up his own mind, with the understanding that they need to know what he wants to do by the start of free agency.
Even if Rodgers doesn’t want to stay (he likely didn’t want to stay with the Jets in 2025), he’ll seize any opportunity to air grievances and/or paint himself with the broad brush of victimhood. McCarthy needs to take the high road, biding his time until Rodgers decides to move on. Either by giving them a clear answer before March 11, or by giving them no answer and forcing them to make other arrangements.
Still, it won’t be a surprise if Rodgers tries to play a game of P.R. chess with McCarthy and the Steelers. Either because Rodgers can, or because Rodgers hopes to stick it one last time to the guy who didn’t draft him, 21 years ago.
These are not your father’s Steelers. Or your grandfather’s Steelers.
Per multiple reports, the Steelers plan to hire former Packers and Cowboys coach Mike McCarthy as the team’s next head coach.
The move breaks dramatically with the team’s history, since 1969, of hiring defensive coordinators with no prior head-coaching experience. It also parts ways with their longstanding practice of hiring younger coaches, with the apparent objective of keeping them around for a long time.
Chuck Noll coached the team for 23 years. Bill Cowher had the job for 15 seasons. Mike Tomlin recently resigned after 19 years. Each was a defensive specialist.
McCarthy, who has 18 years of head-coaching experience, has one Super Bowl appearance. It came 15 years ago, when his Packers beat the Steelers. (And it got a street named after him in Green Bay.)
A Pittsburgh native, McCarthy has a regular-season record of 174–112–2 and a postseason record of 11-11. Which gives him 310 more games of head-coaching experience than Noll, Cowher, and Tomlin had, combined, when they got the job.
And while one source called the move an upset on par with Villanova over Georgetown, there were indications that the Steelers would break from their formula of defensive-minded coaches. The game has changed dramatically since the Steelers hired Tomlin, 19 years ago. Offense means more than ever before, as does player safety.
Moving forward, the question will be whether the Steelers can extend their streak of nailing head-coaching hires to four in a row. However it plays out, it’s hard to envision the 62-year-old McCarthy sticking around for as long as Noll, Cowher, or Tomlin did.
Arthur Smith didn’t land the head coaching job with the Titans, but he could make a return to the team in a familiar role.
Jeremy Fowler of ESPN reports that the Titans have spoken to Smith about joining Robert Saleh’s staff as the team’s offensive coordinator. Smith interviewed with the Titans for the top job earlier this month.
Smith capped a 10-year run as an assistant in Tennessee with a two-year run as the team’s offensive coordinator. He parleyed that role into a three-year stint as the Falcons’ head coach and he’s spent the last two years as the offensive coordinator for the Steelers.
The Steelers made the playoffs in both seasons, but Mike Tomlin stepped down after their loss to the Texans this month and Smith could now return to Tennessee. If he does, he’ll be charged with helping to develop 2025 first overall pick Cam Ward and growth from the quarterback would be a plus to Smith’s hopes of landing another head coaching job.
The Commanders have interviewed another candidate to run their defense.
Nicki Jhabvala of TheAthletic.com reports that they have interviewed Teryl Austin for the position. Austin has been in the same role with the Steelers since 2022 and was the secondary coach and senior defensive assistant in Pittsburgh from 2019-2021.
Austin has also been the defensive coordinator for the Bengals and Lions as well as a defensive backs coach for several other teams.
Seahawks pass game coordinator Karl Scott, former Cardinals head coach Jonathan Gannon, Raiders defensive coordinator Patrick Graham, Chiefs defensive line coach Joe Cullen, and Bears defensive backs coach Al Harris have also been linked to the job. Brian Flores also interviewed for the job, but has since agreed to an extension with the Vikigns.
The list of teams still looking for new head coaches is growing shorter and two clubs still on it will be speaking to Dolphins defensive coordinator Anthony Weaver over the next couple of days.
Dianna Russini of TheAthletic.com reports that Weaver is having an in-person interview with the Steelers on Friday. It is Weaver’s second interview with the AFC North team.
Per multiple reports, Weaver will then move on to an interview with the Bills on Saturday. It will be his first meeting with Buffalo.
The Steelers could stop that meeting from happening if they decide that Weaver is their choice for the job, although that would mean passing on the chance to meet with Rams assistants Nate Scheelhaase and Chris Shula a second time. Both coaches are barred from interviewing until after the Rams play in the NFC Championship Game on Sunday.
The Falcons have completed another interview for their General Manager position.
They announced that they have met with Steelers assistant GM Andy Weidl. They also interviewed Texans assistant GM James Liipfert earlier in the day.
Weidl has been with the Steelers since the 2022 season. He was previously the vice president of player personnel for the Eagles and worked as a scout for the Steelers before joining the Eagles in 2016.
The Falcons have also requested interviews with Bears assistant GM Ian Cunningham, 49ers director of scouting and football operations Josh Williams and Eagles senior personnel director/advisor to the GM Joe Douglas.
