Have Steelers' Draft Classes Been Packed With Mike Tomlin's Unconscious Bias Since 2019?

Mike Tomlin has been the head coach of the Pittsburgh Steelers for 17 seasons. The Steelers have morphed from a Super Bowl contender early in his career to largely irrelevant after the AFC Wild Card Round. Pittsburgh has not won a playoff game in seven seasons. Some of it has been coaching decisions, like the decision to run a fake punt in 2018 in their own territory against the New Orleans Saints in 2018 and handing the ball to Drew Brees in field goal range. Pittsburgh lost that game 31-28, their fourth in five games, and it cost them a playoff berth.

The 2018 season was a significant year in the history of the Pittsburgh Steelers. The “Tomlin” game became a thing in the first of what is now six consecutive seasons with a three-game losing streak. It is also the year that his son Michael “Dino” Tomlin committed to playing for the University of Maryland. It has to make a father proud when his son goes into the family business. It made him so proud that it may have kicked off a trend that has severely damaged the Steelers' organization.

The elder Tomlin is an admitted football junkie. He has confessed that he loves watching any level of football. Tomlin’s love of the game is vital to his professional success, and it is hardly a stretch to think any father who could not attend his son’s games would consume the broadcasts of those games. In 2019, Tomlin took a noticeable interest in the Maryland program, and it yielded disastrous results.

Matt Canada was the offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach at the University of Maryland who recruited the younger Tomlin to play football for the Terrapins. Canada was dismissed after he was promoted to interim head coach during the 2018 season and was out of football in 2019. He was hired as the quarterbacks coach of the Steelers in 2020. Everyone in Steeler Nation is familiar with the disaster that ensued from Canada’s imprint on the offense. What they may not be familiar with is it goes much deeper than the coaching staff.

Tomlin and Kevin Colbert decided that one of the worst teams in the Big 10 should become a priority in the NFL draft. In the 2019 and 2020 NFL Drafts, Pittsburgh picked three players from Maryland, which won a total of 8 games during the 2018 and 2019 seasons. It isn’t unheard of to find a diamond in the rough in a losing program, but the Steelers seemed to be awfully convinced that Derwin Gray, Anthony McFarland Jr and Antoine Brooks Jr were hidden draft gems. It looks like they thought they had inside information. They were wrong. 

The Maryland players the Steelers drafted from those classes have not made many meaningful contributions to the team. McFarland Jr. came the closest, but could not stay healthy and has rarely found his way onto the field for the Steelers. Fans can catch Gray for the Birmingham Stallions and Brooks for the Memphis Showboats auditions in the UFL during the coming spring football season. 

The good news is that the Tomlins have another Division I athlete in the family. Harley Tomlin committed to the University of Georgia in 2022 to join the gymnastics team on a full scholarship. The Georgia Bulldogs were coming off of back-to-back National Championship victories in 2023. Tomlin has spent a lot of time in Georgia over the last two seasons. It could be for the obvious reason that they have some of the best talent in the country, but after the Maryland fiasco, the question has to at least be asked.

Steelers 1st Round Selection In New Mock Draft Proves Georgia Is Still On Their Minds

The Steelers picked George Pickens in 2022. Broderick Jones in the first round of the 2023 NFL Draft and traded up to get him. Pittsburgh also selected Darnell Washington in the third round after manipulating themselves into position to grab him. The latest mock draft by Daniel Jeremiah of the NFL Network is projecting Amarius Mims as the organization’s first-round pick in the 2024 NFL Draft. Sedrick Van Pran is also very much in play to replace Mason Cole in the second or third round of the upcoming draft. Kirby Smart’s program is full of NFL talent on and off the field. 

This is not to suggest that Tomlin does not do his due diligence during the draft process. He truly seems to enjoy visiting universities and meeting potential players. It could just be an unconscious bias that breaks any ties between potential prospects. It was a destructive force when Maryland was in the mix, but his son has moved on to Boston College and his daughter is enrolling at Georgia. As bad as the trend was, if it exists, it is about to turn in Tomlin and Omar Khan’s favor.

If the Steelers are going to adopt the Philadelphia Eagles strategy of picking the best Bulldog available, it will be a vast improvement over the failed Maryland strategy. It will violate a core Tomlinism about seeking comfort, but Steeler Nation has already paid the consequences. They might as well reap some benefits. Unless, of course, Courtney Kupets Carter finds her way onto Tomlin’s coaching staff as the offensive coordinator. Then again, she could hardly do worse than Canada. They don't like the jet sweep in Georgia.

What do you think, Steeler Nation? Is it possible that Tomlin unknowingly was influenced by watching too much Maryland football for the worse, and will closer attention to the Georgia program revamp the roster for the better? Please comment below or on my Twitter/X: @thebubbasq. 

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