Arizona Cardinals head coach Bruce Arians opens up about his 2012 split from the Pittsburgh Steelers, saying he was angry and felt betrayed by the team
The Pittsburgh Steelers made two Super Bowls during the brief time that Bruce Arians served as their offensive coordinator from 2007-2011. However, after his contract ended following that 2011 season, the coach surprisingly decided to retire and the team moved in a different direction.
Something didn’t seem to fit, especially when Arians quickly took the same position with the Indianapolis Colts not long afterward. For Arians, things worked out as he took the interim head coaching job while Colts head coach Chuck Pagano battled cancer, and it led to Arians being hired as the Arizona Cardinals coach.
That doesn’t mean that Arians isn’t happy about how things ended in the Steel City, and he opened up about those feelings recently on HBO’s Real Sports.
"“I got a call on Monday and [Tomlin] said, ‘I can’t get you the money.’ I said, ‘OK,'” Arians said via ESPN. “He said, ‘No, I can’t get you a contract.’ I said, ‘Are you firing me?’ He said, ‘No.’ ‘Well … it’s just a matter of words, Mike. OK. If I don’t have a contract, I’m fired.'”"
Arians said he felt ‘betrayed’ by the team because he had done a good job running the offense. The claim is that the Steelers felt Arians didn’t run the ball enough and had too close of a relationship with quarterback Ben Roethlisberger.
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Things worked out for Arians though, after going 9-3 as an interim in Indy, he has a record of 34-14 with Arizona. His worst record as a head coach so far is 10-6, which came during his first season with the Cardinals.
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