Should the Tennessee Titans hire Antonio Pierce to be their next head coach?

The Tennessee Titans are considering coaching candidates from all different backgrounds in their search for a head coach. The next coach they will meet with is Las Vegas Raiders interim coach Antonio Pierce.

Should the Tennessee Titans hire Antonio Pierce to be their next head coach? No, and there are several reasons why.

First and foremost, no matter what lip service the Tennessee Titans give to everyone else, they need to know that the single most important aspect of this coaching search should be to provide Will Levis with a coach that he can be tied to for the next decade without worrying about changing offenses.

That means that they need someone who has a defined vision for what they want their offense to look like and they are going to be able to explain that to all of the offensive coordinators that come and go throughout the years.

Secondly, Amy Adams Strunk has talked about the next head coach's staff being almost as important as the coach himself. Considering that Pierce has only been coaching in the NFL for two years (and that he has been a positional coach), he just isn't going to have the contacts that any other candidate has.

Another reason is that Pierce has followed the same career path as the guy they just fired and usually when teams fire head coaches, they try to go in a different direction next.

Finally, Pierce just isn't ready for that yet. As interim head coach, he walked into a tough situation, but it was a situation that already had a lot of things put in place. He didn't have to hire any of those coaches, he didn't have to organize the depth chart, he didn't have to have input on free agency, he didn't have to sit in on draft interviews at the combine, etc.

This is a meteoric rise and Pierce might be a head coach someday, but if the Las Vegas Raiders aren't even dying to hire him, that should be a red flag.

There is a place for Antonio Pierce in the Tennessee Titans organization.

Rarely (if ever) does an interim coach go back to the organization that he was the interim coach of, after the season. So Pierce is likely out in Las Vegas, but he has shown that he has great leadership qualities and that he should have a job somewhere.

Even a promotion to DC is too much for me to be alright with right now, but let's say that the Tennessee Titans hire an offensive-minded coach and pair him with Ejiro Evero, currently the DC for the Carolina Panthers until a new coach is hired.

Evero is a rising star in the NFL and he could be a head coach soon, which is exactly the sort of guy that the Tennessee Titans should be looking for as their next DC.

If they land someone like that, then they should hire Antonio Pierce to be the linebacker coach with the idea of promoting him to DC when Evero gets a head coaching job. He was a linebacker coach before the promotion, and with Evero specializing in DBs, it would be a great situation for everyone that maximizes the impact of this coaching staff.

If I were the Tennessee Titans, hiring Pierce for a coordinator role or the head coaching job would be off the table, but a role where Pierce could coach linebackers and quickly rise through the ranks for a head coaching opportunity elsewhere in 2026 or beyond, would be ideal.