The Pomp And Joe Show
Dominique Yates on Jeff Hafley meeting with Steelers; Malik Willis outlook
16 Jan 2026
Chapter 1: Who is Jeff Hafley and why is he a candidate for the Steelers head coach?
The reporting is that among the eight candidates to replace Mike Tomlin, one of them is Jeff Halfley and a former Pitt guy, I might add, spent time on the Pitt staff here, and that he is here interviewing, as far as we know, Donnie. Yes, today.
Yeah, I believe he was the first one. Now, I know they had the virtual interviews with the two Rams guys.
Yeah. He's an interesting candidate. Alex Cazorra over at Steeler Depot wrote a really good piece today on how Halfley is a very well-rounded football guy. He was the head coach at Boston College. I believe he's coached and recruited both sides of the ball. He's got plenty of pro experience now. And how he's ā Cazorra wants him to be the next guy.
So let's get a little more insight on Jeff Halfley. I remember talking to Jeff Halfley one time a long time ago because he was the primary New Jersey recruiter for Pitt, and he got them Deion Lewis, who was not a good player but a great player at Pitt. I think he had 1,800 yards one year and then became a pretty helpful member of at least one championship New England team.
So that's what I remember about Jeff myself mostly. Dominique Yates, multimedia reporter for the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, joins us now. Dominique, how are you?
Hey, doing great. How are you guys? Thanks for having me.
Absolutely. We appreciate you taking the time. So tell us about Jeff Halfley. We got to know him a little bit here, but he's grown into the job a lot more and had a lot of jobs in between Pitt and this one. What would the Steelers be getting here if they hire him?
I mean, he's a guy that has really climbed the ladder in the game of football. He started in college. He spent the first 10 years of his career playing in college, coaching at various schools, then went to the NFL, spent six years there, spent time with the Tampa Bay Bucks, the Cleveland Browns, the San Francisco 49ers, and had a lot of success, and went back to college for five years.
One year as co-defensive coordinator for Ohio State, and then was head coach at Boston College for four years. Granted, it's really tough to win games at Boston College. Quite frankly, it's one of the worst teams in the ACC, just because it's hard to recruit there, and Hard to sustain success with the resources and all of that. But he did coach Zay Flowers and A.J.
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Chapter 2: What insights do players provide about Jeff Hafley's coaching style?
So he's one of those guys that will take the bullets for his players. But you don't leave a press conference saying, man, I didn't really get anything from him. or he was rude or disrespectful. You just don't deal with that from Halfley. So he's the type of coach that fans would want to represent the franchise.
And, you know, he's a guy that, again, the media would enjoy talking to and just kind of picking his brain about football. That's really been the type of guy that I've seen over the last two years.
Dominique, going back to something that you said earlier about the time that Halfley spent at Boston College, it sounds like you think it would be pretty unfair to base any sort of head coaching prospect that Halfley has in the NFL just based on some struggles at BC, where he went 21-26 in his time there.
You can't.
It's
like I mentioned, it's just, it's really tough to win at Boston college. You look right now, you know, Bill O'Brien, who is a, you know, solid coach who's coached in the NFL as well. And, you know, had some success with offenses and went to the playoffs and even on the, you know, collegiate ranks at Penn state, he had a good two years there.
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Chapter 3: How has Jeff Hafley's coaching experience shaped his candidacy?
And right now he's struggling at Boston college. It's a program that won two games this past season. So it's, I couldn't look at Hathaway as a coach and say, oh, man, look at that time at Boston College. Because, again, in terms of what he had to deal with, he did a good job in developing guys because I mentioned Zay Flowers and A.J.
Dillon, and I'm probably even missing some guys that are in the NFL during his tenure. So I think he did a good job in retaining players the best he could. And like I said, trying to win a few games here and there. So if you're looking at Hasley as a head coaching candidate, you just can't really look at Boston College. I think more than anything, you could see that he did more with less.
But then he gets to the NFL with the Packers, and he has Devontae Wyatt, Micah Parsons, Xavier McKinney, Edgeron Cooper, and some talented players. and they were really good defensively. So I feel like he's the type of coach, when he has good players that can understand his system, he can have some success.
Dominic, some of the Packers' struggles defensively late in the season, how much of that do you put on Halfley, or how much do you put it on Parsons being injured and changing the defense?
It's both. I would say I wouldn't give him a complete pass for that. But I do think it's no question Parsons was able to hide some of the issues defensively, in particular in the secondary. It's clear that when the Packers released Jair Alexander, they would have some issues in the secondary. They traded for Nate Hobbs. who they hoped to play outside, and he dealt with injuries as well.
But when he did play outside corner, they didn't have some success. So when you lost Devontae Wyatt in the interior, who was playing the best football of his career, and Parsons, you had an idea of what this defense was like. And one thing that he did, you could tell he tried his best to hide the corners. but you can only hide so much when you don't get pressure on the quarterback.
So I think that, you know, I would say he has a little bit of blame in terms of playing it safe in the secondary. And obviously Caleb Williams and those guys took advantage of that late in the season. But there's no question when you take one of the best players in the, in all of football off the field, they're going to be struggles. He had 12 and a half sacks in terms of Parsons. What,
83 pressures, 26 quarterback hits. So yes, when he's not on the field, it's a different defense. But I think that he maybe could have done a little bit better job in making sure the corners were in better position to have success. But injuries, number one. But then number two, like I said, he maybe could have done a little bit better in having those guys more prepared.
Dominique, do you think there is a particular position group on the defense that thrived or grew the most under Halfley's watch?
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Chapter 4: What challenges did Jeff Hafley face at Boston College?
So obviously on the defensive front, uh, Devontae Wyatt took a really good step in the interior. He had four sacks, uh, before he was injured. So I think he was doing some good things in this system. Uh, linebackers, Edrin Cooper, he was a young guy, but he has thrived at linebacker and he looks like a future star. But then on the back end, Xavier McKinney and Evan Williams did some good things.
McKinney, he was with the Giants, and he was a good player, no question about it. That's why the Packers paid him a lot of money. But he's having some of the best success of his career as well. He was a first-team All-Pro last year, second-team All-Pro this year. So those are some of the guys that have really ā elevated their games because of Hathaway.
So those are some of the notable players that, you know, really stood out to me that did some good things, as well as Javon Bullard. So I would say McKinney, Bullard are the two notable guys that took big steps with Hathaway's system. Then Cooper at linebacker and Devontae Wyatt on the interior.
Dominique Yates, multimedia reporter for the Milwaukee Journal-Senator. Well, as it turns out, Dominique, this franchise doesn't just need a coach. It needs a quarterback. And Malik Willis, it sounds like, is going to be out there as a free agent. Would he be a worthy signing? What do you see in his future?
You know, he's more intriguing to me than Halfley, to be honest with you, because you look at his start with the Tennessee Titans, and he didn't look like a guy that would be in the NFL that long. Then he goes to Green Bay, and it's no question he's made a lot of strides. So does he deserve to get a shot at being a starting quarterback in the NFL? Yes. Will he be a starter? I don't know.
And it's interesting because of Pittsburgh and Malik Willis, I think for him it's all about the right system. So I don't know if Pittsburgh would be the best system for him offensively. I feel like he's a guy that if he had the type of system like the Minnesota Vikings,
or maybe like a Kyle Shanahan-style offense, I think he could have some success because I think that the Packers did a good job in developing him, but they did a bad job in not using him more. I would have loved to see a package this past season with him and Jordan Love on the field just to see what would happen, how would a defense react to it. So he's a guy that I would like to see what ā
He looks like if it's like, okay, you have a full offseason. He's your guy. We're going to see what he can do and kind of give the keys to him, give him a full offseason to work under an offense and see him as a starter. He just hasn't had that in his career. You know, the Titans always tried to draft ahead of him. And, again, he was playing behind Jordan Love in Green Bay.
So I don't know if Pittsburgh would be a great fit, but you never know unless you try it. So he's an intriguing guy, but there's no question he's become a better passer. He reads defenses a lot better now. He always had the athleticism and could run the ball, but the passing has really grown with him. So it would be interesting if he was in Pittsburgh with a full offseason, but
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