The news earlier this week reported here that the Steelers weren't going to fire Adrian Klemm at the end of the season caught some by surprise considering the team's offensive line play this season.
Here's the thing: Just because the Steelers weren't leaning that way with a few weeks remaining in the season, doesn't mean it still couldn't have happened once the season ended.
Steelers president Art Rooney II isn't one to make rash decisions. He'll take the season in as a whole, digest it for a few days once the season -- however it ends -- is completed. And then he and Mike Tomlin will sit down to talk about Tomlin's staff.
That's how it's worked for years. That's how Rooney's father, longtime team president Dan Rooney, did things as well.
They'll always allow the dust to clear and then make decisions.
Which brings us to offensive coordinator Matt Canada. Like Klemm, no decisions have been made in season regarding the status of Canada. That's something that will happen once the season is over.
But to say Canada isn't on shaky ground would be a stretch. The offense hasn't been good. It's averaging 20.1 points per game after averaging 26.0 per game last season. That's quite a decline.
Canada was hired with the mandate to run the ball more effectively in 2021 than the Steelers did the previous season. And yet the Steelers enter Week 17 averaging 87.6 yards per game barely up from 84.4 yards in 2020. They are 29th in the NFL in rushing after finishing dead last a year before.
So, there has been a slight improvement, but not nearly enough.
The feeling within the organization is that it's a 50-50 bet on whether or not Canada is retained after this season, one year after replacing Randy Fichtner as offensive coordinator.
It wouldn't be a completely unwelcome move by some on the coaching staff. While the defensive and offensive staffs often watch tape together to come up with a game plan, I'm told Canada watches game film on his own in his office, away from his staff.
Canada came to the Steelers in 2020 with his only experience having come in the college game. And I'm told Canada hasn't gone out of his way to develop relationships with other coaches on the staff. That's fine if that's his style, but it does rub some wrong.
The two no-comments this week -- one from Najee Harris, the other from Trai Turner -- when asked about the call to run a pitch to the outside last Sunday on fourth-and-1 against the Chiefs, were telling. Either could have said the players just didn't get the job done on that play call. Neither offered any kind of reply to suggest they supported the call.
However, there's also the feeling that Canada was handed the keys to the car this year, but that Ben Roethlisberger's limitations in terms of movement and the team's offseason salary cap constraints limited what Canada could do with the offense. That could buy him another year to implement more changes.
We won't know, however, what side Rooney comes down on until a week or even two after the season is completed. But let's say these next couple of weeks are important for Canada.
MORE STEELERS
• While Ben Roethlisberger is done after this season, he'll count $10.34 million against the Steelers' salary cap in 2022. But considering the Steelers have Mason Rudolph under contract at a cap hit of just over $4 million and they can put a restricted tender on Dwayne Haskins for slightly less than that, they still won't have big money spent on the quarterback position. In fact, even with the $10.34-million cap hit they have for Roethlisberger, they still have $44 million in available cap space. And that includes T.J. Watt's salary hit at $31.1 million, a number the Steelers obviously can renegotiate down to create additional cap space. That total also includes Minkah Fitzpatrick's fifth-year option of $10.62 million. And as we saw this year when Watt signed his deal and lowered his 2021 cap hit by $1 million, a new deal for Fitzpatrick could create more, not less cap space. -- Lolley
• While the web sites that keep track of NFL salary cap numbers show the Steelers with $10.2 million in available cap space, the number is actually just under $9.1 million according to the NFLPA's web site. Why the difference? Remember that NFL teams can bring two additional players up off their practice squad each week to help fill out the roster. That costs additional money. That, among other adjustments and roster moves, has cost the Steelers $1.1 million in cap space during the season. The salary cap web sites are nice tools. But they're also not always the most accurate reflection of a team's current cap situation. The Steelers can roll any unused money over to their 2022 salary cap, so it's not like that additional cap space is going anywhere. -- Lolley
PENGUINS
• When Evgeni Malkin spoke with reporters Wednesday, it was his first time doing so since his injury and his first time doing so in-person since the pandemic hit. He wasn't aware that interviews were back to being in-person until just before he had to talk, and he seemed a little excited over it. As soon as he got in the room he yelled "POTASH!" at Dan Potash, excited to see him again. When he got to the podium he gave the disclaimer that he doesn't know how good his English is now because he hasn't had to talk in six months. It's still good, in my opinion. -- Taylor Haase in Cranberry, Pa.
• Frustration levels were high in the Wilkes-Barre locker room this week as they've lost five of their last six games, all five losses being to Hershey. After Monday's especially frustrating loss in which the team allowed three third-period goals after a good start to lose 4-1, coach J.D. Forrest didn't meet with his players in the locker room after the game, instead leaving the players to sit and reflect on what happened themselves. Several players spoke up and gave speeches themselves, including P.O Joseph, who has emerged as a real leader on that team this season. -- Haase
• Former Penguins defense prospect Ethan Prow made his NHL debut at age 29 last night for the Sabres and scored a goal in the loss. Wheeling has sent the most personnel to the NHL of any other ECHL team, with Prow being No. 66. Wheeling's had 16 goaltenders make it to the NHL. Current Nailers head coach Derek Army previously played in Wheeling with Casey DeSmith, who at the time was Wheeling's third goaltender. Now as a head coach, he tells his goaltenders about DeSmith's path out of Wheeling to encourage them. "I think goalies especially in this organization take pride in, this 'Hey, I could be the next Casey DeSmith'," Army told me. -- Haase
• When the Penguins acquired Jason Zucker in February 2020, his wife Carly -- a huge Bret Michaels fan -- had tickets to see Bret Michaels the night of Zucker's debut in Pittsburgh. That day she posted on Twitter that she was "Coming (to Pittsburgh) to support the only man who could keep me from Bret Michaels - Sidney Crosby. Oh, and Jason Zucker." Zucker made it up to her over the holidays, getting her a guitar signed by Michaels for Christmas. The saga has a happy ending after all. -- Haase
• The recent resignation of Paul Maurice in Winnipeg makes Mike Sullivan, who was hired Dec. 15, 2015, the third longest-tenured active coach in the NHL, trailing only Jon Cooper of Tampa Bay and Detroit's Jeff Blashill. And while NHL teams have a reputation for jettisoning coaches faster than clubs in other sports, one personnel official of a Western Conference club, who happens to be an unabashed fan of Sullivan's work, holds a decidedly contrarian perspective. "This is my question," he said, speaking on condition of anonymity. "Why is an NHL coach's leash so long? Some of these coaches have been (in their current jobs) forever." For the record, Cooper, the league's most-tenured coach, will complete his ninth season behind the Lightning bench in March. -- Dave Molinari at PPG Paints Arena
• Mark Recchi, a fourth-round draft choice in 1988 who was a key member of the Penguins' Stanley Cup-winning team in 1991 who ultimately earned induction to the Hockey Hall of Fame, credits tough love from his dad, Mel Recchi, and his agent, Rick Curran, with helping to make his success in the NHL possible. "They didn't feed me lies," he said. "They were honest with me. If I was brutal, (they told me) I was brutal. They weren't going to blame anybody. 'Hey, look at yourself.' " Recchi, a member of Sullivan's staff for three seasons after a stint on the Penguins' player-development staff, is now an assistant to New Jersey coach Lindy Ruff. -- Molinari
PIRATES
• Going into this offseason, director of coaching and player development John Baker told me one of the areas of development the Pirates wanted to dive into this winter was body movement. We started to see that earlier this year when they named Victor Black as the minor-league pattern and throwing coordinator – focusing on how both pitchers and position players are throwing. And there’s more evidence with the hiring of Caitlyn Callahan, who has a degree in kinesiology, as a development coach based out of Bradenton, Fla. A wave of front office and coaching hirings are expected this week, and I would expect many of them to have some sort of background in body movement or kinesiology. -- Alex Stumpf
• Another one of those new hires is Eric Munson as Class AAA Indianapolis hitting coach. Last year’s Indianapolis hitting coach, Jon Nunnally, is going back to Altoona, where he coached in 2019 and at the alternate site in 2020. You’d be hard-pressed to call working with Nick Gonzales, Liover Peguero and Henry Davis, most likely as a midseason call-up, a demotion, though. Minor-league coaching assignments aren't like players where you have your best in AAA, second-best in AA, etc. The Pirates value Nunnally as a coach and he’s going to the spot where some of the best hitting prospects will play. As for David Newhan, the Curve’s hitting coach from last year, it sounds very unlikely he is returning as a hitting coach next year, though I can’t say for certain if that means he’s going to a new organization or a new role with the Pirates. -- Stumpf
• Utilityman MIchael Chavis is going to be one of the contenders for the Pirates’ middle infield jobs this spring, though just as a second baseman. One thing he is going to have to rectify if he wants that starting job is how often has chases out of the zone, chasing just over half of the pitches that didn’t fall in the Gameday strike zone last year. That’s a problem because since his debut in 2019, his 52.2% whiff rate on pitches out of the zone is the seventh-highest in baseball (min. 600 PAs). He was aggressive at the plate in the past, but it really spiked up in 2021, perhaps due to him pressing because he was bouncing between the majors and minors with the Red Sox and only getting to play a dozen games with the Pirates because of an injury. Any strides he can make with pitch recognition would go a long way to winning a roster or starting spot. -- Stumpf
