1. Making Matt Canada Steelers new offensive coordinator
Matt Canada is a former college coach who was hired to be the Steelers quarterback coach in 2020. Throughout his time as an assistant offensive coach and a brief stint as a head coach at Maryland, Canada’s offense really impressed, and he fits the mold of the innovative, young offensive minds in the NFL.
After Randy Fichtner’s team fell apart late in the season, his contract wasn’t renewed – paving the way for Matt Canada’s promotion to offensive coordinator. We got a taste of Canada’s offense early in the 2020 season, as his fingerprints could be seen on the playbook. The Steelers found great success early with Canada’s pre-snap motion and play-action passes, but that was quickly removed (which could have been why the offense fell off so badly late in the season).
Now, Canada will get to work his magic full-time. Though he has a difficult task ahead of him with a 39-year-old quarterback who has told us he doesn’t love to use play-action or pre-snap motion, he will have to make it work. We’ve seen the effect a good offensive coordinator could have on an offense, which is why no offseason move was bigger this year than making Matt Canada the new offensive coordinator for the Steelers.
There are a number of other offseason moves worth noting this year, and some with perhaps even bigger implications on the team. However, these five were really moves I could get behind in 2021.