PITTSBURGH (93.7 The Fan) – Mike Tomlin cut his coaching teeth around a couple of the coaches leading the Raiders Sunday. Including Tomlin’s former boss in Tampa Bay, head coach Jon Gruden.
“Gru has no fear,” Tomlin said Tuesday. “He’s doesn’t. He looks at an issue or a problem and he sees it as an opportunity. I was with him for four years. You can’t fake that. It’s every day from him. I probably always generally had that mentality, but he helped me hone it. ”
Tomlin began his coaching career as a college assistant at age 23. Gruden gave him his first NFL job. He was a 29-year-old defensive backs coach for the Bucs.
“The positive energy that he consistently brings to whatever challenge that the job presents helped me and helped me grow in a big way as a coach when I worked for him as a young guy,” Tomlin said.
The now 15-year Steelers head coach says his counterpart brings a dynamic strategy. He says Gruden keeps defenses off-balance by how they use personnel, change pace, plus their pre-snap shifts and motions.
He has similar respect for first-year Raiders defensive line coach Rod Marinelli. Tomlin also worked with him in Tampa Bay where he was defensive line coach as well. He said what you saw in the game against the Ravens on Monday was not a fluke.
“Quality, quality football coach,” Tomlin said. “I was not surprised at all to watch Crosby and Nassib and Yannick (Ngakoue) and Hankins be the catalyst for splash for them.”
Against the Ravens, Las Vegas had three sacks, four tackles for loss, seven quarterback hurries and three fumbles recovered facing one of the top offenses in the NFL in 2020.
“Those sack-fumbles and those game-changing plays,” Tomlin said. “There is nothing mystical about it. That’s the culture they are building over there, that’s the standard that they are held to. You can’t be surprised when those plays come to fruition.”
“That could probably describe every defensive line unit that Rod has coached in the last 25 years in the NFL. I know I benefitted from it as a secondary coach when we worked together in Tampa.”
Sunday is not the time for reunions, but what those two coaches instilled in Tomlin helped shape not only the coach you see now. It influenced the defense you see that held the Bills to a touchdown Sunday.