Cam Heyward

There's safeguards a team can make when hiring a hc a year or two early and that comes in the form of Sr Assistants/ Assistant HC roles. A great up and coming coach will almost always have a quality old dude focused on the opposite side of the ball they coach. If we're talking about a young offensive mind, then we couldve looked at guys like Pete Carroll or Marvin Lewis to fill that role; if we hired Shula then McCarthy could've filled that role. A young Tomlin had Lebeau to help guide and nature.

 

This is what we did with Cowher and Tomlin (I assume not Noll, but I wasn't watching football at that time).

I assumed that it was what we'd do this time too.

But I think Rooney wants to maximize the shot at the playoffs. And throwing a young HC into a season with ARod doesn't seem like the best recipe for a healthy locker room to me.

 

A young HC probably doesn't even get Rogers to return. The net result would've been guys like Ramsey and TJ demanding trades and Cam retiring... And I would've been ok with that .