Steelers Model Of Stability Increasingly Unpopular With Modern Fans

The Pittsburgh Steelers beat the Las Vegas Raiders in Week 3 of the 2023 NFL season, 23-18. The Steelers benefitted from a Josh McDaniels decision to kick a field goal down by eight points with just over two minutes to play. McDaniels came under heavy fire for the decision. After dropping back-to-back games to the Chicago Bears and Detroit Lions, McDaniels became the first NFL head coach to be fired in 2023 when he was let go late on Tuesday evening.

The PM Team w/Poni & Mueller seized the opportunity to compare the situation to the Steelers, who are the polar opposite of the Raiders. Las Vegas has employed nine coaches in a dozen seasons. The Steelers have employed 16 in 90 seasons and just three coaches since 1969. The former rivals occupy opposite ends of the NFL franchise stability spectrum

Andrew Fillipponi and Chris Mueller lamented that the Steelers were unwilling to make what they felt were necessary changes to the organization. Mike Florio from Pro Football Talk joined the show on Wednesday to share his thoughts on why Pittsburgh has hesitated to make changes.

“This idea that we have had three coaches since 1969 becomes so much of an identity of the organization, [it] makes it even harder to break from it,” Florio said. “That’s the Steelers thing. We are a model of stability. It’s going to take a h*** of a lot to put ourselves in a position where we involuntarily fire this one and hire number four.”

Florio has defended Mike Tomlin in the past with all of the clichés that the Steelers current Head Coach is protected with nationally. The founder of Pro Football Talk has trotted out the winning season's tropes and authored the idea that firing Tomlin would result in a feeding frenzy of interest from other teams. Thankfully, Florio refrained from defending Tomlin and kept his remarks limited to what he perceives as a fundamental reluctance to change how they operate when employing coaches.

Later in Wednesday’s episode, Aditi Kinkhabwala from CBS Sports joined the program. Fillipponi took the opportunity to pose the same questions he had posed earlier to Florio. Kinkhabwala, who has spent much of her career covering the AFC North, responded that the Steelers might be stuck at the far edge of the spectrum regarding patience with a coaching staff.

“I can’t disagree with you,” Kinkhabwala sighed. “You guys have heard me say this, and it feels like two years now, and everyone listening has heard me say this. I would never advocate for someone to lose their job. There is that flip side where you want your players to grow and develop. At some point, you have to think about their development and what’s being done potentially to their detriment. At some point, the results are the results. How many years of the same result do you need before you finally say, okay, the results are not going to be any different.”

It is an incisive question from Kinkhabwala: how long, indeed? The Steelers have endured lulls in the past. Chuck Noll spent most of the 1980s mired in mediocrity but managed to get a team quarterbacked by Mark Malone to the highest-scoring AFC Championship Game in history. After five years of futility and a purge of his coaching staff, Noll found a way to pull off an astonishing upset with Bubby Brister at the helm in his final playoff victory in 1989. 

Bill Cowher had a lot of early success in his coaching career, with five AFC Championship game appearances quickly and an appearance in Super Bowl XXX. In 1998, the team collapsed down the stretch, and the Steelers spent three years on the outside looking in to the AFC Playoffs. Cowher's seat was on fire before a magnificent second act that culminated with him winning Super Bowl XL. 

The Steelers are currently undergoing their longest playoff win drought since the Immaculate Reception broke a 39-year streak. Tomlin has not won a playoff game since Le'Veon Bell broke the franchise single-game rushing record against the Alex Smith-led Kansas City Chiefs, and Chris Boswell kicked six field goals in an 18-16 victory. 

Like Noll and Cowher before him, Tomlin has finally lost his fastball. He has piled apathy on top of compiling a poor coaching staff. Tomlin has always been a below-average tactician, but his best attributes, motivating his team, getting the most from his players, and handling the media, have come into question in 2023. 

Tomlin has increasingly struggled with tougher questions he doesn't like earlier in 2023. He has also either made or endorsed several frustrating personnel decisions. Tomlin insisted on keeping Gunner Olszewski on the roster despite making multiple gaffes. 

He has allowed Matt Canada to design game plans to seemingly keep the ball out of George Pickens's hands. Tomlin has mishandled what looks like a promising rookie class and, perhaps worst of all, allowed any serious judgment of Kenny Pickett's ability to be derailed because of horrible coaching. 

The modern game has seemingly passed by Tomlin and the Steelers. The potential exists that a team could swing the pendulum away from the modern passing game by playing a power offense that smaller NFL defenses just would not be prepared to handle. Omar Khan and Andy Weidl set about building that kind of team for Tomlin and Canada in 2023.

Instead of lining up Broderick Jones and Darnell Washington next to each other as road graters to clear the way for Najee Harris and Jaylen Warren, the coaching staff chose to go another way. Two accomplished rookie run blockers barely play, while Dan Moore Jr. and the smallest tight end in the Super Bowl era, Connor Heyward, get pushed around by opposing defenses. The Steelers running game has been stagnant, and that seems to be the head-scratching plan. 

Steelers' Tomlin Makes Absurd Comments About Defense

The defense has been a much bigger problem than anticipated. Teryl Austin is showing exactly why he was fired as the Detroit Lions and Cincinnati Bengals defensive coordinator. The Steelers have three of the highest-paid defenders in the NFL, with TJ Watt, Cameron Heyward and Minkah Fitzpatrick. Watt would be the leading candidate for AP Defensive Player Of The Year if the defense were not ranked 30th in yards allowed. 

The Steelers don't have to fire Tomlin to affect change in 2024. Art Rooney II and Khan could tell him he is no longer empowered to pick his coaching staff. Khan and Andy Weidl could hire an offensive coordinator, quarterbacks coach a new man to run the offensive line. Tomlin will have to accept that 0-3 in the playoffs since 2017 is not the standard the Pittsburgh Steelers will accept. If he believes his own Tomlinism, the offense will be fixed, and maybe he will have his second act. 

What do you think, Steeler Nation? Is stability code for mediocrity in Pittsburgh in 2023? Please comment below or on my Twitter/X: @thebubbasq.

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