Pittsburgh Steelers president Art Rooney II attempts to side himself from Todd Haley hiring – NFL News
A day after Steelers’ general manager, Kevin Colbert, pleaded the case of their president, Art Rooney II, the official himself has spoken of him being not involved in the hiring of former Kansas City Chiefs' head coach, Todd Haley, to replace their former
offensive co-ordinator, Bruce Arians.
Colbert had a day earlier said that despite being owner of the team, Rooney had not direct involvement in the decision making of his team and the process involves all the managers and coaches.
Now the president himself has come to his rescue, saying that their head coach, Mike Tomlin, had contributed towards the decision of hiring of their new offensive co-ordinator, Haley.
"I think the bottom line is, Mike was comfortable that's who he wanted to come in," Rooney said. "It may be fair to say that when he started the discussions and Todd's name was on his original list, I don't think he expected that Todd was the guy he was
going to wind up hiring. But as he had more conversations with him, he became more comfortable that he was the right guy for the job."
Rooney apparently attempted to clear the atmosphere of criticism around him, which has developed following the controversial departure of their former offensive assistant staff, Bruce Arians.
Arians announced his retirement from the league as an offensive coach at Steelers and later it emerged that he was forced to take the dire step in the face of his team’s refusal to renew his contract, which was due to expire later this year (2012).
All the reports around the controversy were based on grounds that Arian’s decision to call it quits had come from the top circles of Steelers management and president Rooney came in the limelight of media as the main suspect behind it.
When Arians came out of his so called retirement to join the Indianapolis Colts in the similar role, media again highlighted the controversial exit of Bruce.
A number of reports claimed that the offensive coach was made redundant by the team management in spite of opposition of their head coach and their quarterback, Ben Roethlisberger.
Now Rooney has denied all those reports saying he in no way interferes in the team’s hiring firing affairs and the decision of bringing in Todd Haley to replace Bruce came in due consultation and contribution from Tomlin.
He said:
"I wouldn't want my role in it to be overestimated because Mike has to decide who he wants on the staff.”
The Steelers boss also ruled out a possibility of differences between Big Ben and their new offensive co-ordinator in the perspective of reported reservations of the player over letting go of former offensive coach.
He said that he had spoken to the quarterback and he is looking forward to get know and work with the new staff without any problem whatsoever.
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