Steelers Hire 5 for Bill Walsh Diversity Coaching Fellowship
The Steelers have hired five interns as part of the Bill Walsh Diversity Coaching Fellowship, the team announced on Wednesday.
Those five coaches are Akron cornerbacks coach Marion ‘Tre’ Bell, Lake Travis High School head coach Charles Burton, East Stroudsburg DBs Coach and Passing Game Coordinator James Daniels IV, Morgan State assistant special teams coordinator, and running backs coach Jerome Smith, and Central Connecticut State outside linebackers coach Charles Williams III.
The fellowship was created in 1987, and it is used to try and helo increase the diversity amongst NFL coaches at large. As of recent, many staffs have been urged to add more offensive coaches, as those tend to lead to more head coaching jobs. It is open to college, high school, and former coaches.
Bell was hired by new Akron head coach Joe Moorhead this offseason to become the team’s cornerbacks coach. Prior to heading to Akron, Bell was a graduate assistant at Florida State for a season and at Mississippi State for two seasons. He started coaching as a quality control coach at Eastern Kentucky in 2018, where he worked with defensive backs.
Burton was hired as Lake Travis’ head coach in 2021, and was previously the head coach of Del Valle high school for over 8 seasons. He has plenty of experience and played at Syracuse as a linebacker from 1997 to 2001. Burton would flirt with a professional career, playing over in NFL Europe back in the 2000s.
Daniels is a Pittsburgh native who played for Seneca Valley. He played his college football for Mount Union from 2009-2011 before turning to coaching. Along the way, Daniels has made stops Dayton, Buffalo, Towson, Notre Dame College (Ohio), Becker College, and Ohio Northern University. Now, he is the passing game coordinator and defensive backs coach for East Stroudsburg University, where he has been for three years.
Smith started coaching at Morgan State and earned the title of assistant special teams coach and running backs coach in 2019. He played his college football at Syracuse as a running back, where he would rack up over 2000 career rushing yards and was an All-ACC Third-Team selection.
Williams was hired by Central Connecticut State as the outside linebackers coach in 2021. He had spent time at lower levels including American International College and Windsor High School, both coaching linebackers. As a player, Williams played for Arkansas Pine-Bluff, Central Connecticut State, and Assumption College as a linebacker.
The fellowship will last through the end of the training camp. Coaches will learn from the Steelers coaching staff and get hands-on experience in hopes that it can help spring their careers forward.
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