How Mike Tomlin Did the Impossible

When Bill Cowher retired following the 2006 season, the job of "Head Coach, Pittsburgh Steelers" opened up for only the second time in the past 40 years. No other job in sports - and perhaps no other job in America - carried with it the kinds of expectations that this one did. The job description was to take over a franchise that was the league's most successful in the past four decades. It was a franchise who had five Super Bowl trophies and who had been previously led by two Hall of Fame coaches. Most daunting of all, it was a franchise whose fans are admittedly spoiled and expect championships every year. Meeting the expectations would be incredibly difficult. Exceeding them would be impossible. The man the Steelers chose for this task was a 34 year-old Minnesota Vikings assistant named Mike Tomlin.

To make matters even more challenging, Tomlin's hiring was met with resistance from the Steeler Nation. He only had one year of experience as a coordinator (typically considered the stepping stone job towards becoming a head coach). Some people thought that the Rooney's only hired him to make sure that they "walked the walk" of the silly NFL minority interview policy that they created. Others were worried that he would destroy the team's legacy. On the day that Tomlin was hired, I pulled these random comments off of the PG's "Blog N Gold" message board:

         - Tomlin, The Beginning of an Era, The Destruction of a Franchise.
         - Almost as big a mistake as cutting Johnny Unitas or not drafting Dan Marino. The Rooneys blew it in their frantic desire to adhere to the "Rooney Rule".
         - Well Super Bowls are out of the question. All Steeler stuff in the Garbage, not wasting my time following this waste of time. Ruin a good team cause you are too cheap to pay.
         - Hopefully, Steelers fans, I am wrong, but this man's opinion is we are headed for another 30+ years resembling the 1933-1969 era.
         - We will be lucky to go 2 and 14 in 2007.
         - My thoughts go out to Nate Washington, Willie Parker, Brett Keisel, and other players who were up and coming with Cowher..... It's scary that the Rooneys would sell their players out like this.

Yikes! Tomlin did have some good things on his resume. He was a disciple of Tony Dungy, who himself was a disciple of Chuck Noll. He sounded great when he did his first few interviews and press conferences. He was young and had a lot of upside, just like Noll and Cowher when they were hired. However, when Noll was hired, the team was awful. Even when Cowher was hired, the Steelers were coming off of a rough decade. Tomlin would have to live up to standards that were seemingly unattainable. Did it bother him? Not at all.

"I love the high expectations that come with this job," Tomlin said recently. "I'd rather have high ones than low ones. It's a sense of pride. The tradition is awesome, you can't put a price tag on it. It's inspiring, not only to me but I think everybody who's in this organization. Standards are great. As parents, we try to hold our kids to high standards. Those who have come before us set the standards for us. We understand that when we come in the building, we understand that when we take the field. We try to honor those guys."

Amazingly, Tomlin has done more than just meet the standards and honor the tradition. By taking the team to the Super Bowl in his second season, he has somehow EXCEEDED the impossible expectations set for him. If he ever felt any pressure at all, it never showed. In fact, he seemed to thrive off of it. His no-nonsense and calculated approach has worked wonders. He put ego aside, retaining Dick Lebeau to run a defense that did not even resemble the scheme that he was used to running. He was not afraid to make tough decisions like putting all-pro DT Casey Hampton on the PUP list after he showed up to training camp overweight. It was a growing process for the young coach - some of the players talked about how Tomlin adapted his tough no-excuses style towards to better suit the makeup of his team this season, and certainly he has become more fiery on the sidelines. He also scaled down his practices this season after the team got beat up and tired at the end of last season. One of the most important characteristics of a great leader is the ability to recognize mistakes and learn from them.

The fact that someone could do the job Tomlin has done given the enormous amount of pressure that he was under just speaks volumes about the character of this man. The Rooney family hit yet another homerun when they made this bold hire. Tomlin is now 60 minutes away from officially joining his two predecessors in the legendary category of championship coaches. Not bad for a guy who I wrote was a "wasted token interview" after his first meeting with the Rooney's. I think he loves proving people wrong, and I hope he keeps doing it for years to come.

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