Adios Casey Creehan

And now we can say it is official. The Hamilton Tiger-Cats are in the market for a new defensive coordinator as Casey Creehan is off to Winnipeg.

When the rumours started to swirl back in November, I touched on some of the guys I thought would be candidates for the job. The list included Greg Marshall, Gary Etcheverry, Mike O'Shea, Orlondo Steinauer and Chip Garber. We can now add Jeff Reinebold to the list as well.

I won't go into detail on each of them, but I will say that Marshall, Etcheverry, O'Shea and Steinauer would be fine candidates. All of them have coordinating experience and that is something I would like to see in the next defensive coordinator. The last two hires the team has made, Casey Creehan and Corey Chamblin, cut their coordinating teeth with the Ti-Cats and neither had much success. I would pass entirely on Reinebold and Garber. They may have experience, but they haven't had success.

And if Dee Webb has his way, Orlondo Steinauer will be the guy. Webb took to Twitter earlier today to stump for the Argos defensive backs coach.

"Bring Orlondo Steinauer back to the jungle," Webb tweeted out at 9:35 this morning.

Of all the possible replacements I've named, Steinauer has the least amount of experience. He was the Argos defensive coordinator in the second half of the 2011 season after the Argos fired Chip Garber and moved back to DB coach when the Argos hired Chris Jones. I think Steinauer would make a great defensive coordinator and would support his hiring fully. He may lack the experience of the other potential candidates, but if you look at the work he did with Toronto's secondary this season, you can't help but be impressed.

Another name to remember is Tim Tibesar. He was named the defensive coordinator in Montreal last year before abruptly leaving that position to take up the same one at Purdue University. But with the firing of Purdue head coach Danny Hope, Tibesar is free. He might be a long shot, but he has CFL experience, so keep his name in the back of your mind.

Unlike last year's head coaching search, I don't expect this coaching search to last almost six weeks. The Ti-Cats will do their due diligence, but they probably won't drag this out. I don't know when a new defensive coordinator will be named, but I'd be surprised if we didn't know who he was before Santa comes down the chimney.

The Next DC

It is looking more and more like Hamilton will have a fourth different defensive coordinator in as many seasons. If the rumours are to be believed it is a fait accompli that defensive coordinator Casey Creehan will head back to Winnipeg to take up the same position on Tim Burke's staff. With the Bombers firing de facto defensive coordinator Chip Garber, it looks more and more likely that Creehan will head west sooner rather than later. That goes against what I said when Burke was retained as Winnipeg's head coach – and in my defense, I was looking at it from Hamilton's perspective, not Winnipeg's – which means it is highly likely that the Ti-Cats will be in the market for a new defensive coordinator once again.

So we might as well start speculating now on who that could be.

There are a number of qualified candidates and one popular among the Tiger-Cat faithful is former defensive coordinator Greg Marshall. Many wanted Marshall to take over for Creehan at the midway point of the season. It was a ridiculous notion at the time – Marshall is still getting paid handsomely to not coach the Roughriders – so him jumping into the fray at midseason never made sense to me. But that changes now, not only with the off-season here – which means Marshall would have all the time he would need to find the right players for his defense – but also because Marshall has expressed a desire to return to coaching. Marshall is probably at the top of the wish list for many, but whether he would want to return to Hamilton, however, is another matter entirely. But Marshall is hardly the only qualified candidate.

What about Gary Etcheverry? He flamed out as the head coach at the Univeristy of Ottawa, but the guy is still one heckuva defensive coordinator and was the man in charge of the Rider defense that went to two consecutive Grey Cups. Etcheverry is a bit unorthodox, but that might be just what this team needs.

Some other possible candidates are Mike O'Shea and Orlondo Steinauer, both currently coaching with the Toronto Argonauts. O'Shea is still public enemy No. 1 in Hamilton, but he has grown in his three years as special teams coordinator in Toronto and could be in line for promotion. Steinauer was defensive coordinator with the Argos for the last half of the 2011 season when the team fired Chip Garber and went back to being the team's defensive back coach when the Argos hired Chris Jones from Calgary.

And perhaps Garber himself could find his way to Hamilton to replace the man that many believe will be replacing him.

One thing I think is near certain is that Hamilton will hire an experienced coordinator for 2013. The days of experimenting with unproven talent is over (I don't consider O'Shea or Steinauer unproven talent seeing as they have both been coordinators); there will be no hot shot young coordinator coming in. I think the team will want a relatively old hand, one that is capable of getting the most out of the players on the roster. Believe it or not, there is talent on the defense, it just has to be harnessed correctly. That will be job No. 1 for whoever the team hires should, as believed, Creehan bolts back to Winnipeg.

Tim Burke To Remain Bombers Head Coach

News out of Winnipeg today is that Tim Burke has had the interim tag removed from his name and will be the head coach of the Blue Bombers next year. Burke took over the job in August following the firing of Paul LaPolice. Winnipeg, who made the Grey Cup last season, was officially eliminated from playoff contention last week.

Burke was a finalist for the Hamilton head coaching job last winter and word is that if George Cortez had not agreed to come to Hamilton, Burke would have been the man to lead the Tiger-Cats this season. Instead, Cortez was hired and Burke remained in Winnipeg as the defensive coordinator until taking over as head coach at mid-season.

There was a slight hope in me that Burke would not be retained by the Bombers and would find his way to Hamilton as the team's defensive coordinator. But the Bombers have played better with Burke and it comes as no surprise that he will be given a chance to shape the team in the way he wants.

So where does that leave Hamilton? A lot of Hamilton's defensive deficiencies have been blamed on first-year coordinator Casey Creehan, but the defense has recently played very well – not coincidentally, players like Bo Smith and Markeith Knowlton have started to get healthy – and that bodes well for Creehan. In a statement I probably wouldn't have made back in the summer, I think Creehan will be back as Hamilton's defensive coordinator next season.

We Should Have Seen This Coming

With the notable exception of Chris Williams, there has been nothing to cheer about for fans of the Ti-Cats since the end of July. It has been five games since the Ti-Cats last claimed a victory, a thrilling 35-34 come-from-behind victory over the Saskatchewan Roughriders. Everything looked up for the Ti-Cats when they entered their bye the following week. Some were arguing, rightfully, that the Cats were the best team in the league at the time. What has happened since has obliterated any thought of the Ti-Cats being the best team in anything. The team is now 3-7 and the season is quickly getting away from them. But in looking at the situation, should we really not have seen this coming?

Despite Obie's "more better" proclamation last winter, we probably should have all been prepared for what has transpired. I'm not saying a five-game losing streak, but when a team changes so much, growing pains are to be expected. Maybe not to this extent, but a losing streak or some adversity was on the menu this year for the Tabbies, regardless of how things were spun by the team.

Coaching, and especially player, changes happen often, but the Ti-Cats went out of there way to overhaul the coaching staff and roster of a team that fell one game short of the Grey Cup last year. I'm not here to argue whether those changes were the right ones, but the number of major changes that occurred in Hamilton during the winter months made a rough patch or disappointment inevitable.

The team also made a number of questionable roster decisions after training camp started that have also led the team to where they are today. They let Belton Johnson go so they could start Marc Dile, which looks like a horrible move in retrospect. They sat Markeith Knowlton in Week 1 because of ratio problems, but thankfully they quickly reversed that decision the following week. They continue to sit Avon Cobourne, only playing him when Chevon Walker is injured and Sam Giguère continues to see more playing time than Dave Stala, despite the latter clearly outperforming the former.

Rookie coaching mistakes and a lack of chemistry between the players was the inevitable byproduct of the off-season overhaul. With eight games remaining, the time is now for the team to turn things around. That said, the growing pains and struggles we have all witnessed to this point should have come as no surprise to anyone.

Greg Marshall Ain't Walking Through the Door

There has been a lot of talk the last week about the Tiger-Cat defense, and rightly so. After seven games, the defense ranks last in many defensive categories and has held opposing teams to under 30 points just twice. Fans have been debating just what the problem is, with most placing the blame squarely on defensive coordinator Casey Creehan. Many have even called for Creehan's job. The popular name for a replacement is former defensive coordinator Greg Marshall.

Well, I hate to break it to all those clamouring for Marshall's return, but he ain't walking through the door. Marshall was fired as head coach of the Saskatchewan Roughriders last August and they will be paying him for this season and next not to coach. He gets his full salary from Saskatchewan and gets to spend time with his family. This also means he can be very picky when it comes to accepting another job. He can wait for the job he wants (a position in Ottawa, perhaps) as opposed to taking a job he needs. Since he's getting paid, he doesn't need to work. Don't get me wrong, I'd love to see Marshall return – I never wanted to see him leave – but the chances of him returning, especially at mid-season, are pegged at slim to none in my books.

I understand why people are frustrated with the state of the defense right now, but fans need to be realistic in how the team will improve in that area. It won't be by hiring a new coordinator at mid-season. How often does that truly make a difference? Desperate teams, ones like Saskatchewan and Toronto last year, make changes at key coaching position at mid-season and they rarely pay off in anything substantial. Saskatchewan saw a little bump after they fired Greg Marshall as head coach last year, but that fizzled and the team finished 5-13 and missed the playoffs. The same sort of thing happened to the Argos after they fired defensive coordinator Chip Garber. The Argos didn't turn it around and finished 6-12 and missed the playoffs for the third time in four years. Making coaching changes at mid-season is not the way to turn an underperforming team around.

Fans calling for Creehan's head and Marshall's return need to understand that those two things are very unlikely to happen. For better or worse, Creehan will probably be the defensive coordinator all season. Fans should probably accept this and put any idea that Greg Marshall will return to Hamilton to rest.

Cortez, Creehan Clear the Air

The story the last two days has been the comments made by player agent Darren Gill stating that there is turmoil in the Tiger-Cat locker room between head coach George Cortez and the players, and Cortez and defensive coordinator Casey Creehan.

Today, both Cortez and Creehand addressed the situation and pretty much called it false and ridiculous.

The most surprising revelation came when Cortez said that Gill denied making the comments. I really do not understand why Gill would say that considering that he made the comments on the radio and the audio is readily available for anyone to hear it.

Like I said yesterday, once the team starts winning all of these problems will go away. The sooner the wins come, the sooner this story gets buried for good.

Supposed Rift is Much Ado About Nothing

What was looking like a slow news day turned out to be quite newsworthy when player agent Darren Gill went on the radio in Montreal and pretty much blasted the Hamilton Tiger-Cats. Gill said that there are some problems in the Hamilton lockr room between head coach George Cortez and his players, as well as between Cortez and defensive coordinator Casey Creehan.

The always reliable Drew Edwards transcribed Gill's comments:

“It's an amazing situation. Hamilton is experiencing some early struggles. In the off-season there was a lot of talk about the head coaching moves that happened around the league. Obviously, so far in Saskatchewan it's worked out. In Hamilton thus far it hasn't.

"I'm not going to tell you that there's major problems in that locker room but they are certainly starting. And they started before Henry Burris got a little tour on the bench. They started basically in week one. George Cortez is not known as a player's coach and that's been known from day one. He's not brought the veterans on his side and it's made it very difficult for him to try and get that team on the right page.

"In fact, there's been some pretty well known confrontations in that team's locker room between George Cortez and defensive coordinator Casey Creehan. They're not on the same page. The quarterback and the coach aren't on the same page. I'm not telling you this team is in trouble but there's certainly some early signs that they are in trouble.”

So according to Gill, Cortez is not a players coach, and is not on the same page as his defensive coordinator and quarterback.

And it all means exactly bupkis.

Are there problems in Hamilton's locker room? I have no idea. But the reason this is even a news item is because the team is 0-2. Remember when people were wondering if Wally Buono should be replaced after the Lions started 0-5 last year? Those same people looked pretty silly when last season ended.

When a team is losing, questions get raised and problems arise. When a team wins, everything is great. So once the Ti-Cats start winning – and believe me, they will start winning very soon – all of these supposed problems will mysteriously disappear. Winning cures everything and this situation will be no different. The alleged problems in Hamilton's locker room are nothing a few wins won't correct.

Casey Creehan Named Defensive Coordinator

The worst-kept secret was finally officially confirmed: Casey Creehan is the new Defensive Coordinator of the Hamilton Tiger-Cats.

Creehan spent the last two season with Winnipeg, where he was their Linebacker Coach. He held the same position with Montreal in 2008, and was the Defensive Line Coach in Calgary the four season before that.

Creehan and new Head Coach George Cortez worked together in Calgary in 2007. It is that previous working relationship which likely helped Creehan get the job.

Creehan comes to the team with no CFL coordinating experience, and we saw how welll zero experience worked last season with Corey Chamblin; however, his tenure in Winnipeg came when the Bombers had one of the best Defenses in the CFL, so hopefully he can translate his success with Winnipeg's Linebackers to the entirety of Hamilton's Defense.

With Creehan on board, the team can develop the defensive roster based around his philosophy. It will be interesting to see what players will be brought back and which ones will be released or allowed to leave. Hamilton is stockpiled with talent on Defense, in my opinion, so it is finding the right way to harness that talent – which I don't think Corey Chamblin did – rather than mass player change that will make the difference.

The hiring of Creehan leaves one coordinating job still vacant, that of Special Teams Coordinator. No names have surfaced and since he hasn't been retained already, I doubt Brad Miller will be brought back. Filling that position is the last major move the Cats have to make to the coaching staff. With free agency set to begin in less than a month, the team will likely fill that position sooner rather than later.