Steelers could know Dick LeBeau's status next week

[mesaSteeler]

Steelers could know Dick LeBeau's status next week
05:54 PM
by Sean Leahy, USA TODAY
http://content.usatoday.com/communit...us-next-week/1

The Pittsburgh Steelers could know by next week if defensive coordinator Dick LeBeau will return to the team.

NFL.com reported that the Hall of Famer told the team he wants to take the weekend to consider his options, but the site said that LeBeau is leaning toward returning.

LeBeau, 73, ruled out a move to another team in the weeks before the Steelers' loss in the Super Bowl.

His contract was set to expire after the season.

[tony hipchest]

im sure dick feels pretty horrible about standing in the way of kevin butlers career advancement and about all the ungrateful bastard steelerfans who blame him for last sundays loss.

although i dont see it, he could very well retire.

[theplatypus]

Maybe he could pass the DC position on to Butler and stick around as a consultant.

[Atlanta Dan]

I believe LeBeau would have retired if the Steelers had won last Sunday - but his defense had a very good year (although not as good as 2008) , he is tight with his players, is used to soem fans being idiots after being in the game for over 50 years, and assumes he has a shot to go out a winner next season.

As far as Butler being handcuffed by not being able to take the Arizona job, he can thank his agent for that by signing a contract that keeps him in Pittsburgh for the length of the contract unless he has a shot for a HC job. In any line of work you can never count on being promoted based on when someone else leaves and I doubt LeBeau will let Butler being stuck behind him impact his decision whether to return.

[TRH]

if he's even thinking about it, he very well could retire. I almost expect him to sign a one-year contract and return for next year.......if anything to try and fix that defense debacle we periodically had last year, including the last game.
Its very hard to retire/walk away after losing a SB heartbreaker. It would have been easier to retire after a regular old playoff loss or a missed playoffs altogether.

[TRH]

Originally Posted by Atlanta Dan

I believe LeBeau would have retired if the Steelers had won last Sunday - but his defense had a very good year (although not as good as 2008) , he is tight with his players, is used to soem fans being idiots after being in the game for over 50 years, and assumes he has a shot to go out a winner next season.

As far as Butler being handcuffed by not being able to take the Arizona job, he can thank his agent for that by signing a contract that keeps him in Pittsburgh for the length of the contract unless he has a shot for a HC job. In any line of work you can never count on being promoted based on when someone else leaves and I doubt LeBeau will let Butler being stuck behind him impact his decision whether to return.

Butler's lucky he didn't get banished to "no-man's land" in Arizona, a graveyard of sorts. "Any" promotion is not always better....he's much better off in the long run

[steeltheone]

Lebeau for 5 more!

[stb_steeler]

It would be a shame for him to retire now. On the clip Americas game he said he'll stick around as long as they'll have him. But things change!

[FanSince72]

First of all, I want to say that I like LeBeau and in an overall sense he's done great work.

I just hope that if he decides to stay, he recognizes that there are 11 guys out there, not just the 7 guys near the line. His defenses consistently rank in the top 3 to 5 overall, but his secondaries generally leave much to be desired lately and that needs to be fixed.

The thing about being a legend is that people tend to only see the good things and that may be great for a guy's reputation but it often hurts the team as a whole.

Take Noll for example.

Once the 70's were over and after Cope anointed him Emperor, he went through the 80's with little to show for it and I think a lot of that was because he was so revered and thus so beyond criticism that no one was willing to say anything to him about the team not doing so great.

By the time he left, he had only won the division just twice in the entire decade, but when Cowher took over in '92, we suddenly became a team that was regularly posting double-digit wins every year and we finished first in five of the next six seasons and went to a Super bowl.

I don't think it was so much that Cowher was any sort of genius, but rather that he was young and enthusiastic and represented a fresh new way of working with the team. Noll wasn't any less of a coach, he was just getting stale but he was The Emperor and there sure as hell wasn't anyone who was going to point that out to him.

I just don't want that to happen with LeBeau is all.

[Fire Arians]

i support lebeau, but part of me thinks he should retire.

if butler has as much potential as i've heard, i'd like to see him step up to the DC position maybe sooner rather than later.

in either case, i support lebeau's decision to stay or retire

can't say the same for arians though