Mike Tomlin - 3 Year Extension

[warfelg]

If he didn’t turn to LJ he was likely fired that year. 

[Dcash4]

1 hour ago, August4th said:

I wonder when Harbaugh is going to start getting the playoff woes talk tomlin has(rightfully) gotten

3 playoff wins in 11 years and arguably had the biggest postseason choke in AFC playoff history in 2019 vs tenn....

His turn to Lamar bought him more time for sure. He also had playoff loses with significant snaps from Tyler Huntley (2 games, 1 start). 

I am stealing from my sheet I have been keeping updated on coaching playoff success:

Tomlin: Made playoffs 65% of his seasons coached. Won a playoff game in 36% of his postseason trips. 

Harbaugh: Made playoffs 69% of seasons coached. Won a playoff game in 64% of his appearances. 

I do think the axe is coming for him, though, if he can't get to the super bowl soon -- hell, maybe this year? Can you imagine canning Harbaugh with a playoff failure and then signing King of Annapolis Bill Belichick to bring the "championship" factor to that team?

[warfelg]

I’m not asking this to make anyone look better or worse - but @Dcash4 have you ever given thought to ‘weighting’ those postseason wins/losses? For example a 2 seed beating a 7 seed, then losing to the 4 should be seen as worse than being the 6 seed losing to the 3 seed. Or having the bye, facing a 6 seed after the bye and winning, then losing the CCG would be a bigger issue than being the 5 seed that loses to a 4 seed. In a majority of matchups the upper seed should be winning, so losing to a lower seed is a ‘bigger’ disappointment than being a low seed that may have gotten in on a tie breaker and lost to a better team. Also losing on the road is “lesser” than losing at home. If you want to go really down the rabbit hole you could assign value to every positional group and have weighting for loss of starter snaps and how that impacts.

Like I said, it’s a neither here nor there, partially personal feeling of what kinds of losses feel more significant to me. I’m more upset over being the higher seed that loses to a lower seed than as a 1 and done where you barely make the playoffs in the first place. I think weighing the quality of the wins and losses in the playoffs would be an interesting thing to look at.

[Dcash4]

16 minutes ago, warfelg said:

but @Dcash4 have you ever given thought to ‘weighting’ those postseason wins/losses? For example a 2 seed beating a 7 seed, then losing to the 4 should be seen as worse than being the 6 seed losing to the 3 seed. Or having the bye, facing a 6 seed after the bye and winning, then losing the CCG would be a bigger issue than being the 5 seed that loses to a 4 seed.

I haven't because the caveats beget caveats on a larger scale. Most seasons there is a wildcard team with a better record than a team holding a home game. In 21 the 49ers were the 6 seed, despite beating division winning Rams twice...but had Kittle, Deebo, and starting QB Garappolo miss games and lose. Last year the 5th seeded Browns shared the same record as the 3 seed, but lost to the 4 with a worse record. Did anyone really believe that the Titans were the best team in the AFC in 21?

Seeds are usually determined for the top 4-6 seeds by 2 games, so 1-2 weeks with a major injury can knock your top seeded team into the wildcard round. Doesn't mean you are't the best team when healthy. Division record is a tie breaking mechanism and it's just truth that some divisions are much, much stronger than others. So there's just too many factors to say "this seed beat that seed" honestly. 

So, on a smaller sample size -- yes, those things matter. But over a 6-10 year period it matters less. You either did or didn't, IMO. The Ravens should have beaten the Bengals with Tyler Huntley if not for a fumble returned for a TD, but when you zoom out and say you Harbaugh has 3 wins in 11 years that's not as easy to digest. It's the same with Tomlin for me. I have very legit (at least in my mind) excuses for now winning 3 of those games...but the only thing that matters over the course of the last 6 years is that we didn't win any of them. 

While I do think it would be interesting to see, I also think it would be impossible to measure accurately. 

[warfelg]

I guess this will be a “to each their own” thing, but those things kinda matters to me. When 6 years covers 3-4 games that’s such a small sample size. Even the full career for Tomlin, it’s 18 games in a 17 year career (274 regular season games). So that’s why some of those things that provide context to me matters.

FWIW I don’t want to take it wrong that I’m excusing the postseason losses in that they don’t matter. Because they do. We need to see a postseason win ASAP. But I feel really different about a playoff loss with QB3 where we won 5 1-score games because of the defense vs losing as a healthy high seed.

But anyways, like I said, it’s a neither here or there thing because applying weighting isn’t going to significantly alter the output.

[jebrick]

The Steelers have not had a reset which is remarkable.  Even though people want to complain about NALS, they have gone 23 seasons without a earned top 10 pick.  14 of those years paying a franchise QB.  These last 2 years have seen more turnover on the roster than the last 10.

 

[3rivers]

3 hours ago, jebrick said:

The Steelers have not had a reset which is remarkable.  Even though people want to complain about NALS, they have gone 23 seasons without a earned top 10 pick.  14 of those years paying a franchise QB.  These last 2 years have seen more turnover on the roster than the last 10.

 

but for a while it looked as though a reset would have helped this team . They found a way to stay mediocre, and then now appear to have turned the corner and are ready to compete. A great offseason has helped all this,  smith OC, OL help and ILB help. Now let Minkah  play FS as it's supposed to be and it could be a good season

[jebrick]

13 minutes ago, 3rivers said:

but for a while it looked as though a reset would have helped this team . They found a way to stay mediocre, and then now appear to have turned the corner and are ready to compete. A great offseason has helped all this,  smith OC, OL help and ILB help. Now let Minkah  play FS as it's supposed to be and it could be a good season

Resets help all teams.  The only one close is KC which has not had a reset in a while.  Sf has not had a high pick in a while

 

[43M]

Not a huge fan of this, but we saw it coming.

Barring us finding a special franchise QB, I see 3 more years of largely the same results weve had the last 10+ years.

Believe it or not, I really hope Tomlin can get this team back to being a true contender, I just dont see it.    However, admittedly, I probably wont have much faith in this team until AR2 is no longer calling the shots.   

[August4th]

8 hours ago, jebrick said:

Resets help all teams.  The only one close is KC which has not had a reset in a while.  Sf has not had a high pick in a while

 

I bet KC goes through a reset by now if they didn't trade for mahomes. They are honestly not that much talented than everyone else, they just have mahomes lol. A big trade up might be the way for us to get our guy, if we keep not bottoming out. I really hope something clicks for fields and he can be that guy.

[warfelg]

28 minutes ago, August4th said:

I bet KC goes through a reset by now if they didn't trade for mahomes. They are honestly not that much talented than everyone else, they just have mahomes lol. A big trade up might be the way for us to get our guy, if we keep not bottoming out. I really hope something clicks for fields and he can be that guy.

Yup. There’s two things that generally help the teams that don’t bottom out. First is the aggressive behavior. And Buffalo trading up for Allen. Philly trading up for Wentz. Rams trading for Stafford. Likely a few others I’m missing on. 
 

The other category is the sheer dumb luck as I see it. Geno Smith suddenly being good helped Seattle avoid it. Tom Brady hitting the market when TB had a bunch of rookie contracts. Lamar Jackson being an MVP. Jalen Hurts going from college afterthought to stud in the NFL. But in 3/4 of those cases those guys didn’t start right away and/or the offense changed massively. 

SF is almost both. Tried to create it by jumping up to draft Lance to replace Jimmy G. And that didn’t work and they got lucky with Purdy. If Lance worked out we never see Purdy TBH.

Anyways. Point being a lot of teams that never bottom out fully and continue being right where. Difference IMO is they tend to be aggressive in getting a QB to upgrade. So is it really a reset when for the most part the team is the same and the QB changes out? 

I dunno I think that’s why we should be impressed that we seemingly didn’t have a post Ben plan, downgraded the entire QB room, yet we’re still right there. Not sure how many teams can say that a declining aging roster with a lack of a long term plan stayed in the playoff hunt while getting redone. 

[Dcash4]

16 hours ago, warfelg said:

When 6 years covers 3-4 games that’s such a small sample size.

It may only cover a small amount of games, but those games are the highest weighted in importance. Also, the years with no games speak to not even being good enough to get the opportunity to play. So it's not 3-4 games to judge over 7 years, it's just simply 7 years. 

16 hours ago, warfelg said:

But I feel really different about a playoff loss with QB3 where we won 5 1-score games because of the defense vs losing as a healthy high seed

I absolutely agree with that in a one game sample size. Looking purely at 2024; the outcome of that playoff game is predictable based on circumstance. I don't judge Tomlin negatively for not winning that game in anyway. 

But when you zoom out to a 7 year period, it turns from "I understand why we lost to that one" to "why can't we win one?". Somewhere along the line we are not making enough difference despite some things/areas we might need to overcome -- which all teams deal with. Last year the Packers beat the incredibly talented Cowboys team. The year before the Giants with Daniel Jones took down the Vikings. The year before that the 6th seeded 49ers made it to the conference championship game where they blew a 10 point lead in the 4th. The year before it was the 6th seeded Titans taking down Brady and the Pats in Foxboro. 

At the end of the day, IMO, it just is what it is. We are through 7 years with no playoff wins. Some we were favored, some we were not. There are really valid excuses as well as extremely biased ones. Over that length of time you just can't argue with excuses (I know you aren't, I am just speaking out loud). Tomlin's running out of excuses, IMO, to get it done. I think he has 2 years in which he will tie himself to one of these QBs (I don't think they give him another chance for a new QB, but that's a convo for another day) in order to get 1 playoff win. They won't (read: shouldn't) give him a chance to go a decade without a playoff win in this City. 

[warfelg]

21 minutes ago, Dcash4 said:

It may only cover a small amount of games, but those games are the highest weighted in importance. Also, the years with no games speak to not even being good enough to get the opportunity to play. So it's not 3-4 games to judge over 7 years, it's just simply 7 years. 

Not necessarily. 2015 is one of a few instances. Jets were 10-6, lost out on 2nd WC team by virtue of tie breaker, but the 9-7 Texans made it in. 2022 for us we had the same record as the Jags, owned the tie breaker at 9-8, but they won their division so they were in and we were out (and that was after missing on a tie breaker with the Dolphins). If you want to make it cut and dry like that, like I said, to each their own.

 

21 minutes ago, Dcash4 said:

I absolutely agree with that in a one game sample size. Looking purely at 2024; the outcome of that playoff game is predictable based on circumstance. I don't judge Tomlin negatively for not winning that game in anyway. 

So why not assess them each like that?

21 minutes ago, Dcash4 said:

Some we were favored, some we were not

2 games we were favored out of the last 5 losses. The 5 losses we were minimum 1 score underdogs. 2020 we were home favorites by 3.5 points which is basically a toss up in Vegas's eyes (and then we got hit with the Pouncy snap for Browns points and the Ben pick 6 in the 2nd drive). And in 2017 we were 7 point favorites against the Jags. To be honest the 2017 game was the only one of the last 5 losses that really deeply bother me from a coaching standpoint.

21 minutes ago, Dcash4 said:

Tomlin's running out of excuses, IMO, to get it done. I think he has 2 years in which he will tie himself to one of these QBs (I don't think they give him another chance for a new QB, but that's a convo for another day) in order to get 1 playoff win. They won't (read: shouldn't) give him a chance to go a decade without a playoff win in this City. 

I feel like this is where I bounce back and forth some to be honest. Lets say the run game is humming, OL looks great, defense is it's usual top 10 self, but Russ shows to be declining and Fields isn't working out. I think he should get a chance (for the record, I think one of those guys is going to be "just good enough" in that they will be right there, they won't make many mistakes, and we could have a chance at winning a playoff game, but they aren't likely to be "the guy").

Personally, I'm not a stake in the ground we need a playoff win ASAP. I'm more stake in the ground we need a direction. We need a vision for what this team is. If we walk away from the year going "we got a dominate OL, a stud WR1, a top 10 TE, a developing WR2 (Austin or Wilson), and a top 10 defense, we just need to plug an play a QB", I would be ecstatic moving forward. That's a structure a rookie QB you trade up for can come in and be the difference maker in (FWIW I'm not a fan of the 2025 QB class so I hope we can get two years of QB play at above average out of the room). I feel like Pickett/Canada that whole post Ben era felt listless. We weren't a place with the structure to develop, there weren't really any offensive leaders, and all of that.

I mean this gets into a lot of other personal feelings on the matter and stuff not worth getting into too much, but we should have just rolled with Mitch that season and not have drafted Kenny TBH. I mean, lets leave the mistake of keeping Canada to the side (mostly because I feel like everyone agrees with all of that), but I feel like the retool on the fly was not well executed. So I guess that's why I give Tomlin a little more leeway the last few years than I would if this was him coaching, say the Chiefs and having the same issues.

Anywho long story short on my feelings:
I get Tomlin has warts. I think sometimes we overanalyze them because of the time/familiarity. I'm fine with him being given this extension because (personally) I feel that this transition from the Ben era to the next era wasn't managed well, so I'm comfortable letting him see out the next 3 years. Especially since we gave Cowher extensions twice off losing seasons (IIRC) and one time after having only 1 playoff win in 7 years.

[warfelg]

https://x.com/ASaunders_PGH/status/1800551218965512468

Alan Saunders article here is a good one that kinda sums up my feelings on it.

[3rivers]

8 hours ago, 43M said:

Not a huge fan of this, but we saw it coming.

Barring us finding a special franchise QB, I see 3 more years of largely the same results weve had the last 10+ years.

Believe it or not, I really hope Tomlin can get this team back to being a true contender, I just dont see it.    However, admittedly, I probably wont have much faith in this team until AR2 is no longer calling the shots.   

thats how I felt.

2024 is the mulligan though, free vet QB and the OL should be good . OC will have the run game going and the defence got the help it needed especially if Minkah can play as he should. Not perfect, but for a mulligan it's better that hacking away in the woods like we have the last several years. 

this might be a flash in the pan season, then back to Mr.529 as usual or perhaps Khan and Weidl can keep the team legit.  I'm not sold on tomlin, but if the OL ends up being top tier and the run game is it will help the defence thats already to be good.  Those can cover up some mediocre coaching,  but wait and see.

Was tomlin the one that hired Smith or did someone else really push the issue. Not the typical tomlin hire ala fichner or canada