Steelers give Tomlin a contract extension.

[Livewire]

 

[MOSteelers56]

Well deserved. I hope we keep him locked in for another 10+.

[43M]

10 hours ago, MOSteelers56 said:

Well deserved. I hope we keep him locked in for another 10+.

That would likely mean we are having success after Ben is gone.....so yeah, for sure.   

[Magnus-Viktor]

Well keeping a coach is good if he's actually winning as the talent on the roster says they should and doing a good job.  I wouldn't say he is doing that by any means.  The team has carried him instead.  Not impressed with the way the Steelers handle their coaching staff lately.  I must admit that at least last year the defense showed signs of improving, and I love the offense (which I imagine Tommy Boy has nothing to do with, it's all Ben and Haley, just like the formerly great D was all LeBeau and Cowher's roster).  The cheerleader gets a contract extension anyway though.  Hopefully they can win in spite of him as they have (to an extent) ever since he got here.  

[Chieferific]

14 minutes ago, Magnus-Viktor said:

Well keeping a coach is good if he's actually winning as the talent on the roster says they should and doing a good job.  I wouldn't say he is doing that by any means.  The team has carried him instead.  Not impressed with the way the Steelers handle their coaching staff lately.  I must admit that at least last year the defense showed signs of improving, and I love the offense (which I imagine Tommy Boy has nothing to do with, it's all Ben and Haley, just like the formerly great D was all LeBeau and Cowher's roster).  The cheerleader gets a contract extension anyway though.  Hopefully they can win in spite of him as they have (to an extent) ever since he got here.  

By no means do I think Tomlin is a "great" coach but he's not "terrible" either. You could do better. You could do worse. The difference is, I don't know that you could do that much better than Tomlin but I think you could do a whole lot worse. I for one never got the Cowher love. Talk about the ultimate cheerleader. I know that's blasphemous to most Steeler fans but he was clueless when it came to "Xs" and "O's". Fans fell in love with the whole fired up/spitflying spectacle that was Cowher but his play calling left a lot to be desired and cost them many a game. He played not to lose. While Tomlin isn't an elite coach I think you could do much worse and not that much better. I'd take him over Cowher personally.

[Magnus-Viktor]

2 minutes ago, Chieferific said:

By no means do I think Tomlin is a "great" coach but he's not "terrible" either. You could do better. You could do worse. The difference is, I don't know that you could do that much better than Tomlin but I think you could do a whole lot worse. I for one never got the Cowher love. Talk about the ultimate cheerleader. I know that's blasphemous to most Steeler fans but he was clueless when it came to "Xs" and "O's". Fans fell in love with the whole fired up/spitflying spectacle that was Cowher but his play calling left a lot to be desired and cost them many a game. He played not to lose. While Tomlin isn't an elite coach I think you could do much worse and not that much better. I'd take him over Cowher personally.

 

Ok, here is the main difference for me personally.  Cowher proved that he could put together a great roster, except QB.  Year after year, almost 50% of his entire career, taking over a team that had only been to the playoffs ONE time in SEVEN years, and even that year was 3 years removed, he went to the playoffs 6 straight years.  7 times in 15 years his teams went at least to the AFCC.  If you throw out that last year, which I believe you should do since he clearly wasn't himself with his wife's illness, it is exactly 50% of the time.  To the conference championship 3 of those 6 and should've won a SB if not for Neil O'Suckell.  Averaging 11 wins.  How can you argue with that?  It's not like he pulled a Tomlin and inherited a team 1 year removed from a SB win, with the best roster in the NFL complete with a future HOF QB in his prime.  He inherited a .500 team that wasn't even a playoff team.  

He had 2 down years, rebounded to another conference championship, another playoff year, then 1 down year that resulted in drafting Big Ben, and immediate dominance.  I think if his wife hadn't gotten sick and Ben hadn't headbutted a car, the Steelers would've won multiple SBs under him, probably repeating in 2006, 2007, and of course if Tomlin could win in 2008, Cowher probably could've went undefeated because he wouldn't have let the OL go to hell like Tomlin did.  

And yes, there was a HUGE shift in drafting after Cowher left.  The most direct change was Tomlin just promoted Cowher's backup scrubs to starting roles, whereas Cowher would've drafted quality OL to replace them as they aged or left.  Cowher knew how to target players for the D scheme and Tomlin didn't have a clue.  You could see that Cowher was the mastermind behind putting together his teams, not Colbert.  

So while I do agree that Cowher wasn't the mastermind Xs and Os type, he was the ultimate team builder.  He couldn't find a QB, which there were rarely any good ones available for the taking anyway, but he put together a good OL, great rushing attack, and an elite defense year in and year out.  That's what I liked out of him.  He didn't run his mouth about unleashing hell in December, and then have his team play flat and lay an egg.  I still don't think Tomlin is a very good coach at all (below average, and this team deserves better than that....Ben should have a lot more than 2 SB rings given what he had to work with earlier on with Cowher, LeBeau, etc), but at least the last few years have given me less reason to dislike him.  He and Colbert know how to draft WRs, and that's about it to me.  That is the one and only thing they do better than Cowher did.  

 

In the end, we'll see if he's any good when Ben leaves.  Especially if Bell and Brown aren't around.  I HOPE it works out, and I HOPE the D becomes elite this year and when Ben does leave they find another QB soon and are dominant.  But I just think based on my own personal observations that they'll always win in spite of Tomlin and not because of anything he actually does.  

[Chieferific]

You don't think Tomlin and Colbert have put together a great roster? There are way to many "if's and "but's" in your defense of Cowher. This Offense is as good as Cowher's Defense was. Conversely, I'd say this Defense is about as good as Cowher's Offense was. And do you think it's fair to determine Tomlin's coaching ability by how well he does when AB/Bell/Ben leave? That's nonsense. What coach not named Belichick would do well?  Cowher was Offensively challenged and I think you severely over estimate his drafting prowess including the O-Lines he crafted. This is arguably the BEST Steeler Oline ever and with the exception of AV they were all drafted. Do Willie Colon, Jamain Stephens, Essex, Simmons, Kemoeatu...ring a bell. Unfortunately they do for me. He had far more failures at drafting OL than successes. You can have your 3 yards and a cloud of dust clinging to your 2 pt lead while hoping the timer hits triple zeros. I'll stick with my Offensive juggernaut aiming to score 30 a game.

[Magnus-Viktor]

14 minutes ago, Chieferific said:

You don't think Tomlin and Colbert have put together a great roster? There are way to many "if's and "but's" in your defense of Cowher. This Offense is as good as Cowher's Defense was. Conversely, I'd say this Defense is about as good as Cowher's Offense was. And do you think it's fair to determine Tomlin's coaching ability by how well he does when AB/Bell/Ben leave? That's nonsense. What coach not named Belichick would do well?  Cowher was Offensively challenged and I think you severely over estimate his drafting prowess including the O-Lines he crafted. This is arguably the BEST Steeler Oline ever and with the exception of AV they were all drafted. Do Willie Colon, Jamain Stephens, Essex, Simmons, Kemoeatu...ring a bell. Unfortunately they do for me. He had far more failures at drafting OL than successes. You can have your 3 yards and a cloud of dust clinging to your 2 pt lead while hoping the timer hits triple zeros. I'll stick with my Offensive juggernaut aiming to score 30 a game.

Like I said before, the last 2 years they've actually started to put together a good roster again.  The O is elite, but the focal point of that is Cowher's guy.  Take him away, and we'll see what he can do.  My point was lets see what Tomlin can do without the QB, which is what we saw Cowher do for 90% of his career.  Win with no QB.  I really like this current roster.  So maybe, just maybe, Tomlin and Colbert are figuring things out finally.  Only took them a decade to do so.  I really like the OL and OC as well.  Not sure about the DC yet.  I liked the improvement I've seen overall lately.  

I never said Cowher was perfect by any stretch, but he won a hell of a lot of games with no QB.  That is actually a weakness of his too though, never being able to address QB until Big Ben.  But when you're averaging ~11 wins for your first 6 years, when are you ever in possession of a high draft pick to even try to take a QB?  Besides the year he drafted Plax, he never even had a top 10 pick.   He averaged almost 10 wins per season before he even drafted Big Ben.  TEN!  With no QB to speak of.  With Ben (before he got hurt and his wife got sick in year 3), he averaged 13, won a SB and went to the AFCC where they got Cheatrioted.  You can count 2006 if you want, but I never will.  I know what I saw.  

And no, it's not nonsense at all by seeing what he can do without the Killer B's.  That's called life.  Lets see what he can do without a loaded roster, the most important part being someone whom he had no part in acquiring.  I absolutely want to see what Bellicheat can do without Brady.  And this offensive juggernaut aiming to score 30 a game.....where's it at when Ben is hurt?  In the toilet.  Where's it going to be if he retires after this season and they fail to replace him with another franchise QB?  In the toilet.  Cowher's teams weren't reliant upon ONE person.  Tomlin's is.  It's reliant on Cowher's QB.

It's funny that you make up the point about Cowher being offensively challenged.  I have said many, many times that Cowher was a huge influence on the D but you could directly tell how good the OC was because Cowher was hands-off there.  It worked.  Now Tomlin, on the other hand, what exactly does he do?  He's a former DC, but LeBeau ran things before when they were winning big.  The OC does his job.  So what exactly does Tomlin actually do?  Cheerlead?  Talk big?  That's it for me.  You're entitled to your opinion, but for me, that's how it is.  

[Chieferific]

So Tomlin is the only coach that depends on a healthy top tier QB to be successful? Okie dokey. And Cowher didn't call the Defense. Mostly it was Lebeau and he was the best ever at it imo. Neither coach called the plays. Most don't. They game plan and prepare their teams. NEITHER is elite at that. And let us not forget that it was Cowher that pounded the table for Phillip Rivers instead of Big Ben. He doesn't get credit for that pick. It was a no brainer that luckily didn't turn out his way.

[warfelg]

1 hour ago, Chieferific said:

So Tomlin is the only coach that depends on a healthy top tier QB to be successful? Okie dokey. And Cowher didn't call the Defense. Mostly it was Lebeau and he was the best ever at it imo. Neither coach called the plays. Most don't. They game plan and prepare their teams. NEITHER is elite at that. And let us not forget that it was Cowher that pounded the table for Phillip Rivers instead of Big Ben. He doesn't get credit for that pick. It was a no brainer that luckily didn't turn out his way.

I agree with you Cowher gets way too much credit for his time here.

 

Any way you cut it, even in injury filled seasons with Ben out, no reason to be in 90% of the games we're in....Tomlin has still only had 8-8 as his worse record.  Heck since Tomlin took over, only 2 teams have a higher winning percentage:  Packers and Patriots.

 

But sure, throw all of that out the window.

[Magnus-Viktor]

3 hours ago, Chieferific said:

So Tomlin is the only coach that depends on a healthy top tier QB to be successful? Okie dokey. And Cowher didn't call the Defense. Mostly it was Lebeau and he was the best ever at it imo. Neither coach called the plays. Most don't. They game plan and prepare their teams. NEITHER is elite at that. And let us not forget that it was Cowher that pounded the table for Phillip Rivers instead of Big Ben. He doesn't get credit for that pick. It was a no brainer that luckily didn't turn out his way.

That defense was good year in and year out.  Dom Capers 92-94 (who has fielded a pretty mediocre D in both Carolina and now as a DC in Green Bay for years), **** LeBeau 95-96, 04-06 (I agree he's the best defensive mind in history), Jim Haslett 97-99, Tim Lewis 00-03., it didn't matter.  Also, it's absolutely absurd to credit 15 seasons of Cowher's defenses to LeBeau who was only there for 5 of them.  Ridiculous claim.  In your world, 33% is "most" lol.  Cowher was the one who assembled the D and it was pretty much always top 10 if not #1/elite.  

You are failing to understand my point here.  I'm saying that we have not seen Tomlin with anything but an elite QB carrying him.  He has proven absolutely nothing.  We know the team sucks when Ben is hurt.  That's all we've seen.  But we also know the team is built with Ben in mind, so seeing what he can do without that crutch is my entire point.  Other coaches were hyped up when they had a QB and when they didn't they were proven to be mediocre or suck.  Cowher proved to be damn good with no QB.  There's no debating that.  5 AFCC in 12 years and 1 trip to a SB.  All with no QB.  When he had Ben?  AFCC both years and a SB win (maybe more if not for Cheatriot's Spygate).  When Tommy Boy does that, get back to me.  It will never happen.  We all know that.  It's literally impossible since he's already failed miserably in that regard.  3 trips to the AFCC or SB in 10 years.  Cowher was 5 for 12 before Ben even got there.  He also didn't build the team that won the SB.  Cowher did.  The last 5 years or so it's been more "his team", and it's just now the last 2-3 years getting good again.  I like where it's headed, but as I said before, lets see what he can do without Ben.  Can he replace him faster than Cowher could find a franchise QB?  Can he field a competent team without a veteran HOF-caliber QB?  None of us know.  That's the point.  We saw Cowher with and without.  There's no debate here.  10 wins without a QB.  13 with.  Tomlin is 10 with.  

As for the Big Ben vs Phillip Rivers comment, absolutely pointless again.  Many people think that Rivers is great as well.  I've heard many experts, including the commentary during last night's game (if they're experts....they have a job in pro football anyway so probably know a thing or two), talk about that draft class and say that it is just a bad situation that Rivers has been in that has kept him from winning as the other 2 did.  I personally don't think he's as good, but you can't compare guys from 2 completely different settings like that.  I also didn't give Cowher credit for drafting Ben at all if you go read my other posts.  Failing to get a better QB sooner was a failure if anything, but he had very limited chances to get one as well.  He wanted a LT instead of Ben from what I recall hearing.  I said he won WITHOUT a QB.  That's what I give him credit for.  That's a fact, not opinion either.  Averaging 10 wins a year before he had Ben.  For his entire career, over a decade, prior to Ben, he averaged (rounding up, it was 9.6 or so) 10 wins every single season.  With Ben in his first 2 years, he averaged 13.  Tomlin, with Ben, has averaged 10 (10.3).  

[Chieferific]

It was supposed to say Lebeau "and others". Nice catch. You are obsessed with the idea that Bill won w/o a QB (like he had nothing to do with that) and a good Defense. But you are missing MY point. Tomlin has won w/a QB and no Defense. What's the difference? I'd say that's even harder to do in today's NFL than it was during Cowher's era. Today's NFL is more QB focused. That's not debatable. Cowher's NFL was I-formation and Counter-Treys and solid Defense to which he excelled but the League evolved and he was still playing caveman Offense.

[warfelg]

11 hours ago, Chieferific said:

It was supposed to say Lebeau "and others". Nice catch. You are obsessed with the idea that Bill won w/o a QB (like he had nothing to do with that) and a good Defense. But you are missing MY point. Tomlin has won w/a QB and no Defense. What's the difference? I'd say that's even harder to do in today's NFL than it was during Cowher's era. Today's NFL is more QB focused. That's not debatable. Cowher's NFL was I-formation and Counter-Treys and solid Defense to which he excelled but the League evolved and he was still playing caveman Offense.

Amen!!!

 

The thing NO ONE ever dares mention when talking Cowher!  That he came from an era where you didn't need a stud QB.  How many "elite" QB's played most their career in the 90's?  Steve Young, Troy Aikman....and who else?  I'm sure I'm forgetting one or two but I can't come up with much more off the top of my head.  And even at that...I think the COwboys would have been just as good without him because Emmitt Smith and that OL was really damn good.

You know what makes me comfortable with Tomlin as a coach?  At least through Oct 29th last year (closest article I could find to now) with Tommy Maddox, Charlie Batch, Dennis Dixon, Byron Leftwich, Michael Vick and Landry Jones at QB the Steelers are 13-11.  The fact that we don't sink to the depths of the NFL without Ben and a majority of his career has been under Tomlin (IIRC it's 11-11 under Tomlin alone when starting a backup), I think we got to give Tomlin his props for keeping this team together in tough times.

And honestly that's how I measure a coaches success.  How well do you hold the team together when it hits the fan?  I think BB might be about the only one better than Tomlin at it.

[43M]

19 hours ago, Magnus-Viktor said:

 So what exactly does Tomlin actually do?  Cheerlead?  Talk big?  That's it for me.  You're entitled to your opinion, but for me, that's how it is.  

You have zero clue what Tomlin does behind the scenes.  None of us do.    Fans act like they know everything based on what they see on TV, when most coaching goes on BEHIND THE SCENES, when we arent watching and when the camera isnt on them.    

How do you know Tomlin isnt involved in the defense?   Based on interviews with LeBeau, him and Tomlin worked together to make changes to the defense when Tomlin first arrived...many players have spoken about how hands on and intelligent "Coach T" is..but some fans ignore stuff like that and act like they know more about Tomlin than the people who coach with him and get coached by him..     

I still remember when some Steeler fans used to bash Cowher, claiming that all he did was scream and spit all the time. 

Tomlin is far from perfect.   There are definitely things areas of his coaching I wish he would improve (ie....learning from past mistakes, prepping the team better vs inferior teams, etc...), but all of my concerns are based on proven issues with the team over the years under his coaching....not blind assumptions about what his role on the team is.   

 

[JLambert58]

1 hour ago, FourThreeMafia said:

You have zero clue what Tomlin does behind the scenes.  None of us do.    Fans act like they know everything based on what they see on TV, when most coaching goes on BEHIND THE SCENES, when we arent watching and when the camera isnt on them.    

How do you know Tomlin isnt involved in the defense?   Based on interviews with LeBeau, him and Tomlin worked together to make changes to the defense when Tomlin first arrived...many players have spoken about how hands on and intelligent "Coach T" is..but some fans ignore stuff like that and act like they know more about Tomlin than the people who coach with him and get coached by him..     

I still remember when some Steeler fans used to bash Cowher, claiming that all he did was scream and spit all the time. 

Tomlin is far from perfect.   There are definitely things areas of his coaching I wish he would improve (ie....learning from past mistakes, prepping the team better vs inferior teams, etc...), but all of my concerns are based on proven issues with the team over the years under his coaching....not blind assumptions about what his role on the team is.   

 

What we see on Sundays is just the tip of the iceberg.  I can guarantee that Tomlin is in on everything from top to bottom.  Aside for being heavily involved in x's and o's with the other coaches, he's building relationships with those coaches and all of the players.  Creating a cohesive unit of men who believe in his leadership and are all playing hard for the same goal is a difficult job but one he has done extremely well.  (And one area where many other coaches have failed)

Bottom line:  As much as it is a cliche at this point, you have to look at his results.  To go 8-8 or better for 10 straight years in the NFL is an incredible feat.  Sure he's got an elite QB, but as we've often seen, that does not guarantee you a winning record.  At this point, he has earned the trust of ownership, coaches, and players.  As fans, that should be good enough for us.