Steelers Now
One of the Pittsburgh Steelers’ best players of all time did not hold back on his evaluation of head coach Mike Tomlin.
Pittsburgh Steelers’ Mike Tomlin is undoubtedly one of the best head coaches in the NFL. However, he is far from perfect, and former Steelers safety Ryan Clark recently made that very clear.
While Clark still has a lot of respect for Tomlin, who has never had a losing season in his 18 years a Pittsburgh’s head coach, he thinks one of Tomlin’s flaws has gone overlooked for far too long.
“Honestly, picking your coordinators is a big deal, especially when you don’t call plays,” Clark said on the “Green Light with Chris Long” podcast. “If there is a criticism of him, the conservatism is part of it.”
Tomlin does have one of the shortest coaching trees in the league but is the longest-tenured head coach. He has made several very questionable hires, with arguably the worst being offensive coordinator Matt Canada in 2021.
Canada led the Steelers offense to historic lows and still kept his job until midway through the 2023 season.
It hasn’t all been bad, though. When Tomlin joined Pittsburgh, he helped put together a coaching staff that would go on to win Super Bowl XLIII.
However, Clark warns fans about giving Tomlin all of the credit.
“I do believe, and I can be honest, I never really thought about replacing Bruce Arians or Dick LeBeau. What I’ll say about that is, those actually weren’t [Mike Tomlin’s] hires, per se,” Clark said. “He hasn’t found two guys on each side of the ball that has learned to excel in the most important moments.”
Tomlin’s offensive and defensive coordinators are currently Arthur Smith, who joined the Steelers last season, and Teryl Austin, who has been climbing the ranks in Pittsburgh since 2019.
Only time will tell if they can break Tomlin’s brutal stretch of coordinator hires.
This article originally appeared on Steelers Now: Steelers Legend Reveals HC Mike Tomlin’s Biggest Flaw
