The Falcons have shuffled up the responsibilities on their coaching staff a bit this weekend.
The team announced that wide receivers coach Terry Robiskie has been bumped up to assistant head coach under Mike Smith. Robiskie has been on staff since Smith took over the head coaching job in 2008 and the team has sent a wide receiver to the Pro Bowl in each of those seasons.
“Terry has played an important role in our success over the last five years,” Smith said in a statement from the team. “His experience is invaluable to our coaching staff and to our team. We are fortunate to have him on our coaching staff.”
Robiskie’s promotion presumably leaves him as the likeliest choice for an interim coach should the need arise in Atlanta. It’s a role he’s played before. Robiskie lost two of three games in 2000 when Norv Turner was fired by the Redskins and went 1-4 as an interim replacement for Butch Davis in Cleveland in 2004.
There’s not much chance that Smith is getting fired in Atlanta any time soon, of course, but the Falcons can rest assured that they have as experienced an interim coach as there is in the business should something else arise that forces them to go in that direction.