Not everybody is sour on the Pittsburgh Steelers’ hiring of Mike McCarthy. But the boos and hisses are certainly noisy. Count ESPN’s Stephen A. Smith in that latter mix as he said he was “not moved” by the McCarthy hire, according to First Take.
“I’m not moved at all,” Smith said. “I’m not going to be disrespectful to Mike McCarthy and act like the man can’t coach. The man has won 61% of his games. He’s a Super Bowl champion. There is no doubt about that. Eleven and 11 in the postseason.”
It seems ironic that the Steelers hired a coach whom Smith spent years criticizing when McCarthy coached in Dallas. Now, Smith has to suffer with the guy he repeatedly said couldn’t win the big playoff games with the Cowboys.
Stephen A. Smith says Mike McCarthy is too old for the Steelers
It doesn’t fit the mold of what the Steelers have traditionally done, Smith said.
“My problem is when I look at the history of the Pittsburgh Steelers, clearly when you had Chuck Noll, who was there for many, many years, and you hired him at the age of 37,” Smith said. “You found Bill Cowher out of nowhere, you hired him at the age of 35. You find Mike Tomlin out of nowhere.
“And what route do you go now? You go with a 62-year-old. The last time we saw him, he was in Dallas. Obviously, they had back-to-back-to-back 12- or 13-win seasons. So they had some success there. But they didn’t do anything in the playoffs. And that’s who you pick? It’s nothing to be excited about, to be quite honest with you. Especially when you’re still looking for your quarterback.”
However, maybe McCarthy could be a good influence if the Steelers get a young quarterback in the draft. The Fox Sports mock draft has the Steelers taking Alabama’s Ty Simpson at No. 21.
“It’s still unclear if he’ll return to school, but Simpson is the clear No. 2 QB in this draft,” Fox Sports research wrote. “He’s had a mix of incredible games along with some terrible ones, but his decisiveness and accuracy are tools teams can work with.”
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