Steinauer Doesn't Confirm or Deny UW Job Interest After Grey Cup

Once the CFL's Grey Cup ended on Sunday night, Orlondo Steinauer faced an obvious question.

The Hamilton Tiger-Cats coach knew it was coming. It was just a matter of who would ask it. He answered it in predictable fashion. With a non-answer.

Yet Steinauer, 48, didn't offer an outright denial when quizzed about whether he was leaving soon to become the University of Washington defensive coordinator.

“I’m not even commenting on that," the coach said in the postgame media session. "I don’t have anything to say. We just lost a Grey Cup, man. I’m where my feet are.”

Reports circulated throughout the week leading up to the Tiger-Cats' 33-25 overtime loss to the Winnipeg Blue Bombers in Hamilton that Steinauer was on the verge of joining Kalen DeBoer's UW coaching staff in Seattle once the CFL's Super Bowl played out.

Steinauer is a Seattle native who has made his mark in Canada, first as a standout safety for 13 years and then as a coach for another dozen.

Yet in 2019, he went to Fresno State as Jeff Tedford's defensive coordinator and worked alongside DeBoer, who was the offensive coordinator. Together, these coaches turned a 1-11 Bulldogs team into a 10-4 bowl qualifier, just the second team in NCAA Division I history to go from double-digit losses to double-digit wins from season to season.

Steinauer returned to Hamilton from Fresno State and has coached the Tiger-Cats to consecutive Grey Cups, both losses to Winnipeg, with a season in between canceled because of the pandemic.

Should Steinauer choose to come home, he would be paid at least $1 million a year, nearly triple of what he earns as a CFL head coach.

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