Mike Tomlin is on the verge of his first losing season as Steelers head coach.
On the surface, that’s both an impressive and troubling statement. Impressive in that this is Tomlin’s 16th season as head honcho and troubling in that it means the Steelers are going to finish well below expectations, or “the standard” yet again.
Yet I’ve seen another word used to describe it: relief.
Some Steelers fans and analysts will be relieved to finally have the non-losing seasons streak ended because that’s the go-to point for anyone looking to defend Tomlin. I’ll admit, I want to move past that point as well. Many think that once the streak ends and the easy stat grab is no longer true, THEN we can finally get to the heart of the matter and take a critical look at what Tomlin has done lately.
Lately, as in the past 6 seasons. All of which, barring a near miraculous run to end this season, will not result in a single playoff win.
Lately, as in the past 12 seasons, in which the Steelers will have a whopping 3 playoff wins.
Now that the veneer of the non-losing seasons streak is over, we can get down to brass tax on Tomlin, right? As the great Lee Corso (who’s mascot head picks on College Gameday still make me smile) says, “Not so fast my friend!”
The stat won’t go away that easily. I think the national analysts and those who look at the league from a wider perspective will simply say, “Mike Tomlin didn’t have a losing season for the first 15 years of his career.” Boom. Same point made. Same supposed-to-wow-you factor.
And the built-in excuse for that non-winning season? A rookie QB. Easy as that.
While there’s some merit to that excuse, you and I who have watched this team all year know it goes beyond that.
From the hiring of Matt Canada to run the offense to the disregard of the offensive line via the draft over the past few seasons to his defense that was supposed to be “dominant” that he calls plays for continually getting gashed via the run and in second halves of games to the same assistant coach running a special teams unit that’s been below average this season and for the past several seasons.
Yet the easy take will be to blame the rookie QB. Again, Kenny Pickett has had his growing pains this year. I’m not saying there isn’t some validity to the point, but I wonder if the organization isn’t using that same excuse as well.
Art Rooney II might be chalking this one up to just figuring it out with Pickett. And figuring it out without TJ Watt, too. We can’t forget he was out for seven games this year and hasn’t looked right since.
Built-in excuses. Merited? Mostly. Tells the whole story? Certainly not.
So I have my doubts whether the perspective will change much, if at all, on how Mike Tomlin is viewed at the national level after this season. But I don’t really care about that.
What’s more important is how far these built-in excuses go within the Steeler walls. Will there be any accountability? Will Art Rooney II, Omar Khan or Andy Weidl tell Tomlin to let’s say…make some changes along his coaching staff? Strip him of defensive play calling duties?
Or the big one…not giving him that obligatory contract extension because he’s got two years left on his deal. It’s time to pause and not be so quick to just reward the results, because the results shouldn’t be good enough for them.
This isn’t a piece written to call for Mike Tomlin’s firing. I'm just saying he will benefit from the built-in excuses this season has presented and I’m not so sure we are going to get the accountability and change that’s needed.
His seat should at least be as warm as plopping down in an office chair that was just preoccupied by someone else for the past 4 hours. But I doubt that’s actually the case, either.