Pittsburgh Steelers head coach Mike Tomlin answers questions after an NFL football game against the New York Giants on Monday, Oct. 28, 2024, in Pittsburgh. (AP Photo/Jean J. Pasker)
PITTSBURGH — Mike Tomlin may have played it safe. He could have stuck with Justin Fields. The Pittsburgh Steelers’ trademark weekly rock fight, which has been going on for more than five years, could have ended.
But the NFL’s longest-serving coach knew he wasn’t seeing enough. From Fields and the rest of the offense.
There, Tomlin pulled Fields a few days after a relatively easy 19-point win over Las Vegas on Oct. 13, pushing Pittsburgh’s record to 4-2, and Russell Wilson, who has fully recovered from a calf injury. He told them that the time had come to find out. , still ready to cook.
Tomlin shrugged when asked if it was a tough debate considering Fields had 10 touchdowns against one turnover.
“I don’t care about the difficulty of the conversation,” he said at the time. “It’s a question of need or not. We’re after a big business here. Comfort is not part of what we’re after.”
Neither seems satisfied.
The NFL’s most consistent franchise is evolving, approaching it with the type of urgency it perhaps lacked at times during its seven-year playoff drought.
That’s why the Steelers blew up their quarterback room during the offseason, and why Tomlin turned to Wilson in mid-October and essentially said, “Let’s see what we can get.” is.
As it turns out, people believed there was more gas in the tank than Wilson’s sudden exit in Denver.
The 35-year-old threw for 542 yards, three touchdowns, and no interceptions in wins over the New York Jets and New York Giants. The offense surpassed 400 yards in both games, the first time the Steelers have done so in consecutive weeks since 2018.
While this is a promising start, Wilson admitted it’s just a start.
“We have great confidence, but we haven’t done everything yet,” Wilson said. “We’re obviously sitting here at 6-2, which is great, but it doesn’t mean anything.”
Making the playoffs is not an issue for Pittsburgh, which has reached the postseason in three of the past four years. The problem is that once the Steelers get there, they often look overplayed and lack the firepower to keep up with teams like the Bills and Chiefs.
That may change in 2024. Pittsburgh has reached 20 points in five of its past six games, something it hasn’t done since an 11-0 start in 2020, and takes some of the pressure off the defense that has spent the past three years. It was done. I am fully aware that we cannot afford to get into a gunfight.
Cornerback Joey Porter Jr. downplayed the idea that the defense would have more leeway than usual, but offered a variation on Tomlin’s “Standard is Standard” motto, saying Pittsburgh’s ability to score more often , defensive coordinator Terrill Austin has become even more productive. Aggressive.
The Steelers are tied for second in the NFL with 15 takeaways, many of which are momentum-changers like TJ Watt’s strip sack of Daniel Jones and Beanie Bishop’s crucial interception in the fourth quarter against the Giants. , outside linebackers coach Denzel Martin explains in part. As a “culture” of sales.
A matching T-shirt is also available. Coaches will hand them out after Saturday’s walkthrough. It has its own color code. Buy one, it’s a white shirt. Buy two, it’s a gray shirt. Buy three, it’s a black shirt. Watt and Bishop are bringing them together more and more often.
But not everything is perfect. The Giants had a 157-yard rushing victory over the Steelers, which is best for a team whose second-half schedule includes four games against the league’s three most productive teams: Baltimore, Washington, and Philadelphia. It was not an indicator of
The productivity on the ground in New York was a sobering and, in some ways, welcome reminder of the tremendous work ahead.
“I think sometimes it’s good to win ‘despite’,” Austin said. “So I’m really confident in our group coming back and working our tails up to be even better the next time we play side by side.”
It is a methodology that trickles down from the top.
Tomlin’s message when changing quarterbacks was simple. “Good is no longer good enough.” Watt and defensive end Cam Heyward (currently the longest-tenured defenseman in team history) are building careers worthy of Hall of Fame consideration, but neither has reached the Super Bowl. In fact, Watt is still waiting for his first playoff win.
Outside linebacker Alex Highsmith said: “We can’t get complacent because we know it’s the real deal. There’s a lot of tough, tough games ahead of us and we have a lot of tough guys ahead of us. I have a lot of great balls waiting for me,” he said. “And now we know the end goal. So we know we always have to get better and hope to get the championship details.”
Wilson knows a thing or two. He arrived in Pittsburgh in March hoping to revive his career after two underwhelming seasons with the Broncos. It’s too early, it’s very early, but his play thus far has confirmed Tomlin’s determination to disrupt the status quo and lead Pittsburgh down the slippery path it’s been on since reaching the AFC Championship in 2016.
“I want to grow as I go along,” Wilson said. “I think we’re on that journey right now. We’re just on a train that continues to grow. It’s really about what we do and how we do it for this football team. I think it’s very exciting.”
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